Phone Booth (film)

Phone Booth
Theatrical release poster
Directed by	Joel Schumacher
Produced by	Gil Netter David Zucker
Written by	Larry Cohen
Starring	Colin Farrell Forest Whitaker Radha Mitchell Katie Holmes Kiefer Sutherland
Music by	Harry Gregson-Williams
Cinematography	Matthew Libatique
Editing by	Mark Stevens
Distributed by	20th Century Fox
Release date(s)	April 4, 2003 (2003-04-04)
Running time	81 minutes
Country	United States
Language	English
Budget	$10 million
Box office	$97,837,138

Phone Booth is a 2003 American suspense-thriller film about a man who is held hostage in a telephone booth by a sniper. It stars Colin Farrell, Kiefer Sutherland, Forest Whitaker, Katie Holmes, and Radha Mitchell. The film was directed by Joel Schumacher, with music composed by Harry Gregson-Williams. The film was originally scheduled to be released on November 15, 2002, but was delayed until April 4, 2003 due to the Beltway sniper attacks.

Plot

Stu Shepard (Colin Farrell) is an arrogant publicist who is contemplating cheating on his wife Kelly (Radha Mitchell). He calls Pam (Katie Holmes), a young actress, from a phone booth. When a delivery man (Dell Yount) tries to deliver a free pizza to the booth, Stu rudely dismisses him. After the phone call with Pam, the phone rings and Stu answers it. The caller (Kiefer Sutherland), says that Stu should have accepted the pizza as it would have "kept his strength up for what comes next". He warns Stu not to leave the booth. Stu, again dismissive, is skeptical toward the mystery caller. The caller says that he will say hi to Kelly for him, then hangs up, leaving Stu visibly concerned.

The man calls back and reveals that he had previously set up two other dishonest individuals in a similar situation, where he gave them a chance to redeem themselves but since both refused he had to kill them. One was a pedophile, and the other was a business executive who used inside information to cash in his stock options before the company share price collapsed (and refused the caller's request to share the proceeds with regular investors who got burned on that stock). The caller tells Stu that he must tell Kelly and Pam the truth: that he is cheating. The man calls Pam, puts Stu on speakerphone, and tells her that Stu is married and does not want anything with Pam except to sleep with her. He then tells Stu to call his wife and tell her the truth, or else he will. Angrily, Stu does so.

Before he has a chance to tell Kelly the truth, Stu is distracted by three prostitutes who want to use the phone. The prostitutes become hostile due to Stu's refusal to leave the booth, and they start banging against the glass. Stu becomes agitated and finally hangs up on his wife and yells at the prostitutes to leave him alone. As the two girls leave, the man calls and warns Stu that if he hangs up again, he will shoot him. Stu does not believe him but is convinced when the man cocks his rifle. Stu gets scared, warning him that if he shoots, the cops will arrive. However, the sniper proves him to be wrong by shooting a toy robot next to the booth without anyone noticing. The caller continues to mock Stu's faith that the caller is not capable.

The situation escalates further when the prostitutes and their pimp, Leon (John Enos III), approach the booth and demand that Stu leave. Terrified that he will be shot, Stu refuses. The impasse between Stu and Leon escalates to the point of Leon breaking into the booth with a bat and attacking Stu. The sniper tells Stu he can help him and Stu says "yes". Leon is shot in the back by the sniper, horrifying the prostitutes, who accuse Stu.

The police arrive and Stu is instantly the suspect. He doubts that they will find any evidence to suggest his guilt to the murder, but later finds out the sniper has planted a gun in the phone booth's roof, on top of the light panel that could be used as evidence in Leon's murder. Captain Ed Ramey (Forest Whitaker) tries to negotiate with Stu to exit the booth but he says he cannot get off the call and he is talking to his "psychiatrist". Multiple news vans arrive, and reporters begin filming the situation, putting pressure on the police to deal with the situation without appearing trigger-happy. The caller continues to bait Stu by telling him to take hold of the planted gun, or he would "Blow him (Ramey) Away!" but Stu refuses, knowing the police will likely shoot him.

Kelly arrives at the scene and the sniper makes Stu confess to her about his infidelity, which Stu does. The man asks Stu to choose between Pam and Kelly, threatening to kill one of them to eliminate further temptation. The caller tells Stu that there are men trying to tap into the call, but will never succeed as the caller has taken precautions to avoid it.

Stu pleads with the sniper while at the same time using his cell phone to call Kelly, who secretly informs Captain Ramey of the sniper's presence when Ramey hears the conversation. Stu confesses his bad character to the crowd, telling his unpaid assistant, Adam (Keith Nobbs), who looks up to Stu, not to become a publicist and admitting his $2,000 watch is a fake, like himself. Stu explains he grew up in the Bronx and he wanted to put his past behind him by buying expensive clothes. He is also not as rich as he seems.

Captain Ramey (Forest Whitaker) outside the booth negotiating with Stu (Colin Farrell).

The Caller (Kiefer Sutherland) after having talked to Stu in the ambulance.

The police finally track down the sniper by tracing the call the sniper made to Kelly, and Ramey tells Stu through a cryptic message that they have done so. Stu informs the sniper that the cops are coming to get him and the now enraged sniper chooses to take Kelly with him, seeing as she is the most important thing in his life. Panicked, Stu takes the planted gun, runs out of the booth and yells, "it's me you want!" Stu is shot and falls down just as police break into a hotel room, discovering a dead body, a phone, and a sniper rifle. It is then revealed that Stu had been hit by a rubber bullet from a police sniper, leaving him relatively unharmed. Kelly runs over and kisses Stu who is still on the ground. The police wheel the body they found in the hotel room down onto the street, and Kelly insists on seeing the sniper's body. Stu identifies the body as the pizza delivery man.

Stu is recovering under morphine in an ambulance which makes him drowsy. A man carrying a large suitcase walks up to him, and compliments his shoes. The man says that he regrets killing the pizza deliverer and warns Stu that if his newfound honesty does not last, he will be hearing from him again. He walks away and smiles as he passes the phone booth, revealing himself to be the caller. Stu falls unconscious. The caller, now the narrator, says, "Isn't it funny? You hear a phone ring, and it could be anybody...but a ringing phone has to be answered, doesn't it?" The view goes from an aerial view of the city way into space with a satellite passing by turning to black with a ring once again, and the film ends with a man answering, "Hello?"

Cast

• Colin Farrell as Stu Shepard
• Kiefer Sutherland as The Caller
• Forest Whitaker as Captain Ed Ramey
• Radha Mitchell as Kelly Shepard
• Katie Holmes as Pamela McFadden
• Maile Flanagan as Lana
• Ben Foster as Big Q (uncredited)
• Paula Jai Parker as Felicia
• Arian Ash as Corky
• Tia Texada as Asia
• John Enos III as Leon
• Richard T. Jones as Sergeant Cole
• Keith Nobbs as Adam
• Alex Tang as Sam Jones
• Jared Leto as Bobby (Cameo in deleted scenes)
• Dell Yount as Pizza Guy

Production

Larry Cohen originally pitched the concept of a film that takes place entirely within a phone booth to Alfred Hitchcock in the 1960s. Hitchcock liked the idea, but he and Cohen were unable to figure out a sufficient plot reason for keeping the film confined to a booth, and hence they never made the idea into a film. It was only after the late 1990s that Cohen revisited the concept again when the idea of the sniper came to him.

The principal photography on the film was completed in ten days, with an additional two days of establishing shots, pickups, and re-shoots. This accelerated filming schedule was aided by the adoption of French hours, a work schedule that skips the typical one-hour production shutdown for lunch break.

The film is set in real time, so the timespan in which the film takes place is as long as it takes to watch it, much like the television series 24, which also stars Kiefer Sutherland. Like 24, it also uses split screens. Even though the film is set in New York City, it was filmed in downtown Los Angeles (at Fifth Street, between S Broadway and S Spring Street) in November 2000. This is made evident by the LACMTA buses periodically driving by.

Reception

As of October 2011, the film holds a 71 percent "Fresh" rating on Rotten Tomatoes. Ebert and Roeper gave the film "two thumbs up".^{[citation needed]}

Box office

Box office revenue			Box office ranking		Reference
United States/Canada	Other territories	Worldwide	All time US/Canada	All time worldwide
$46,566,212	$51,270,926	$97,837,138	#1,187	#

See also

• Knock Out (2010 film)
• Liberty Stands Still

External links

• Phone Booth at the Internet Movie Database
• Phone Booth at Box Office Mojo
• Phone Booth at Rotten Tomatoes