A Binge too Far #53: The Mega Size Action of the Speed duo (1994 – 1997)

Keanu Reeves and Sandra Bulloch in Speed (1994)

Mega Hollywood stars usually have people driving them in limousines, but Sandra Bulloch is taking the bus [in Speed (1994)] and then the ship [in Speed 2: Cruise Control (1997)].

 

Speed (1994) poster

Speed (1994)

 

A mad terrorist motivated mainly by money (Dennis Hopper, no introduction needed) sets a bomb on a bus full of civilian passengers (led by Sandra Bulloch) that will explode if the vehicle stops speeding over 50 miles per hour. Police officer Jack Traven (Keanu Reeves, in a career-defining performance) gets on the bus and tries to find a solution.

 

Written by Graham Yost (known mainly for his work in television), this is your typical ‘the clock is ticking’ action story, and the direction by Jan de Bont (a cinematographer by trade) is even more conventional, but somehow it is all well-executed enough to keep your interest and allow for a good time to be had. It made a massive $350.4 million at the box-office and it even won a couple of Oscars among other awards, which doesn’t often happen in pictures of this genre, therefore it has become a classic of sorts.

 

Speed 2: Cruise Control (1997)

Speed 2: Cruise Control (1997)

 

A hacker (and embarrassing and embarrassed Willem Dafoe) gets a hold of a cruise’s control in order to drive it into an oil tank, as if terrorists opt for such bizarre actions. It is now up to glorified cop Alex Shaw (Jason Patrick, who for a leading man doesn’t have too much screen time, and we are grateful for that) and his love interest Annie (returning Sandra Bulloch, who probably couldn’t say no to the fat check) to save the day.

 

Doomed to fail from the get-go not only due to Keanu Reeves’ last minute absence but also because you can’t make a film called Speed about a cruise boat because these things are not very fast, so director Jan de Bont is left with a gigantic budget ($160 million) to save the day, and he doesn’t even do that as the whole thing is exceptionally mundane, with every scene resorting to basic coverage and resembling a bad TV movie. It was destroyed by the critics, hated by the paying audiences, and it grossed $164.5, merely making its money back and putting a tombstone to the promising franchise.

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Movie Review: The American Dreamer (1971)

Directed by Lawrence Schiller, L. M. Kit Carson

Movie Review by Greg Goodsell

Just before the disastrous premiere of Dennis Hopper's The Last Movie (1971), compatriots Lawrence Schiller and L. M. Kit Carson hung out at Dennis Hopper's hippie compound in Taos, New Mexico to document what the countercultural phenomenon – ever since his breakthrough feature Easy Rider (1969) that was then – Dennis Hopper. Those expecting a spokesman for a new generation were probably soundly disappointed. Like his contemporary William S. Burroughs, Hopper was an unabashed fan of the Second Amendment (“I think that, in our lifetime, a man without a gun is a fool.”). Even worse, his view on the fairer sex was strictly in line with Hugh Hefner's, if not belonging to the 18th Century's. Women were strictly a commodity to Hopper at that time and were intended to be exploited. A crisis arises after dicking around, sitting around talking about approaches to life and art, the filmmakers become acutely aware that the project at hand has no commercial potential and Hopper remedies this by recruiting some hippie bimbos from a nearby airport and fills the camera's lens with POOOOOO – SAAAAAAY. It all falls apart – as was Hopper's career following the debacle that was The Last Movie.

The American Dreamer only makes sense when set against the trajectory of Hopper's progression as a screen star. Cutting his teeth on low-budget exploitation movies with roles in Night Tide (1963) and Queen of Blood (1967), both directed by his friend Curtis Harrington, Hopper made it big with Easy Rider (1969), a rambling free-form road picture about two hippie bikers' cross-country trek across America. Easy Rider was a smash hit for near bankrupt Paramount Pictures, inspiring other filmmakers to cash in on this “hippie thing.” Giving one of the masterminds of this Cinematic Youthquake unlimited reign, Hopper would sort-of direct and sort-of complete The Last Movie, about an American film crew's negative influence on a Peruvian tribe. Starring Julie Adams from The Creature from the Black Lagoon (1956), Adams pops up in the film to assure the viewers that Hopper's heart was in the right place.