Brake Fail

CAST: Denzel Washington,Chris Pine,Rosario Dawson

rating: ***

When Scott says unstoppable,he means unstoppable. Once you buy a ticket into this film about a runaway train,you won’t get to pause. The 777 goods train,carrying several coaches of toxic chemicals,steams,burns,collides and bulldozes its way through,flicking aside attempts to stop it — with the camera closely following every spark on steel.

Dawson is in charge of the railway yard from where the train set off — after its driver jumped down to flick a switch — while Washington and Pine are driving another locomotive on the same track as 777. You know,of course,that they will be the heroes to stop 777. Unfortunately,Unstoppable spends too much time on all that’s happening around that event,cleverly filling in details by using media coverage,rather than the men themselves.

What should be a gripping drama about a real incident is instead a purely action film,with the central roles played by the trains themselves. It keeps you involved but only for the duration that it lasts. Dialogues are perfunctory,even the two heroes getting predictable sub-plots,and Dawson does little beside throw her hands up and bring down them only to fiddle with her hair.

Sure,stopping a train running at 70 miles per hour and carrying a collective weight of 10 million pounds involves a lot of technicalities (and Scott is obviously interested,given that he also helmed The Taking of Pelham 123). But surely,there are other things at play,like the towns on the way and its scared residents.

On the course the 777 runs,there is also a train with 150 schoolchildren on a railroad safety trip. Other films could have spun that into one big heartwrencher. Granted,Scott spared us that,but reducing it to just another passing train?