A highly entertaining and tense action film!

Rating: 9/10 (30 December 2009)

Take a bus, put a bomb on it, set it to explode if the bus drives at less than 50 mph, and then put every obstacle imaginable in front of it, except maybe a family of ducks, and you've got Speed, one of the best action films ever.
You know, it is interesting that sequels are usually criticized for being all action, no story. Ironically, however, one of my many complaints on Speed 2 was that it was too boring in the beginning. The characters were on the boat for half an hour before the action even started. Speed, however, starts off right away with an action scene involving a smart but crazy bomb expert known as Howard Payne trapping a group of people in an elevator, and threatening to send them falling down to their doom unless he's paid 3 million. However, two LAPD officers, Jack Traven and Harry Temple are able to save the people just in time before going after Howard Payne, which causes Harry to get shot in the leg and Howard Payne to set off a bomb that presumably kills him.
This action scene would make a great climax in a lot of films, yet for Speed it is only the opening scene. After that this film enters what has to be a record for it 10 minutes of no action, where Jack and Harry are awarded medals of honor, and stay up late partying. The next day, however, Jack witnesses a bus driven by one of his friends exploding, and then receives a phone call from Howard Payne who is revealed to have survived the bomb explosion the day before, telling him that the bus exploding was just a demonstration, and he has another bomb rigged to a bus full of passengers that will go on if the bus reaches 50 mph, and will then explode after that if the bus drives under 50 mph, or if one of the passengers tries to get off the bus, and demands a ransom of 3.7 mil to be delivered to him at 11 a.m. After getting the number of the bus, and phoning Harry, Jack heads off to find it, yet arrives too late, as the bus has already reached 50 mph. Despite this, Jack manages to jump on, yet upon seeing an LAPD cop enter the bus, one of the passengers freaks out, and during all the commotion shots the bus driver, forcing another passenger, Annie Porter, to drive the bus instead. Now it is up to Annie with the help of Jack to keep the bus moving at more than 50 mph, while Jack tries to dismantle the bomb and Harry tries to find out where Payne is.
Like I said, the film puts every kind of obstacle in front of the bus. You're barely given a moment to catch your breath after the bus passes through one obstacle before another one appears. It is the kind of film that will keep you on the edge of your seat all the way through it.
And yet despite all of these action scenes, the film doesn't ignore it's characters. Its skill comes in developing its characters while they react to all the action scenes around them. You feel their relief after they get past a very difficult obstacle, and their depression when their situation seems most hopeless. Like Jack, you barely know the passengers when he first enters the bus, yet as time passes they start to become more and more familiar to you, and their personalities began to show.
The actors play an important part in the film. You've got to hand it to Keanu Reeves, from the goof ball Ted to the super cool Neo, he certainly plays a wide range of roles. This time he plays a James Bond type of character with Jack Traven, daring, sarcastic, yet he also makes him more uncertain, and more of a guy who follows his guts than his wits, which helps make the film feel even more tense, especially when you have an awesome villain like Payne, played by Dennis Hopper, who seems to have thought of everything and has it all under control, to the point where you wonder how can Jack outwit him. And Sandra Bullock positively shines as the tough but vulnerable Annie Porter.
1994 was a great year for action films, and Speed was arguably the best of them all. Granted, it doesn't feel out of place if you would put it in a James Bond movie, yet it is done so well that you wish a lot of the James Bond movies could be as good as it, or if its sequel could be as good for that matter.