Just got back from this movie about an older woman (Kim Basinger) who is kidnapped and dials out to a stranger’s cell phone for help. Tonight my wife and I wanted to catch an action movie that didn’t require too much thinking. With a good title and promising previews, we chose Cellular, and ironically it turned out that thinking too hard would only ruin the viewing experience.

- Cellular (2004) -
Official website: http://www.cellularthemovie.com/
IMDB: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0337921/

Main Cast:
Jessica - Kim Basinger
Ryan - Chris Evans
Chad - Eric Christian Olsen
Mooney - William H. Macy

Directed by David Ellis (Final Destination 2) based on a story by Larry Cohen (Phone Booth) screenplay written by Chris Morgan. I found it somewhat interesting that they’d try to make two movies with phones as a key plot element but Phone Booth turns out to be a much better movie than Cellular.

It all begins with young, buff stud protagonist, Ryan (played by newcomer Chris Evans) trying to tell his hot ex-girlfriend how much he has changed and that she should please take him back. She gives him a list of errands to do to make it up to her and on his way to do the first of them he gets a call on his cell phone from a frantic, scared and kidnapped Jessica.

Unsurprisingly she manages to convince Ryan that it’s not a prank call and that he absolutely cannot hang up the phone.  And then she convinces him to give the phone to a policeman. He drives to the police office and offers the one policeman just about to retire working the desk, Mooney (William H. Macy) the phone. Mooney takes some interest, but then a fight with a bunch of arrested criminals breaks out in the lobby and he must attend to that instead. Mooney tells Ryan to take the matter upstairs, literally. Later, Mooney shows some interest in following up on the case which eventually makes him much more significant in the plot.

Ryan goes upstairs, but then starts to lose the cell signal so he stops just shy of the place he needs to reach? He screams for help a few times but of course nobody hears him and comes to aid. Please. Twenty minutes later Ryan is going up a different stairwell without any concern over loss of cell signal! It’s moments like these that make you go: he didn’t just do that, did he? The movie contradicts its own plot boundaries.

As far as acting goes, Chris Evans is on par with leading men most-films-are-bombs guys like Ben Affleck and the ladies will probably get goggly over him shirtless and tatted up. The guys will likely enjoy his eye candy girlfriend who seems to only be there to get in the way later in the movie and serve no other really useful purpose. Why don’t ever find out what happens between these two troubled lovebirds? Why show a couple with relationship trouble and then never tell the viewers what happens to them? Also, there is Ryan’s friend who is there seemingly just to be comic relief in the beginning of the movie. He is not utilyzed much beyond the opening scenes.

Kim Basinger didn’t ring much compassion from this viewer and some of her technical skills seemed way out of character. I kept thinking of her in better roles and that was there to pick up a paycheck and little more. She spends most of the role with watery, mascara-run eyes and in desparation uttering too many unconvincing lines.

Cellular should have been preceded by an episode of Ripley’s Believe it or Not. Here’s some more thoughts and observations on the movie:

- I think they had too many “I’m here to threaten, Jessica” scenes. These kidnappers aren’t that smart … they have way too many opportuniies to kill Jessica and chose instead to keep on threatening her even after they should have determined that she couldn’t help them any more. It’s like if you don’t do what we want, Jessica then this time, really, we are going to kill you. Or your son … or your husband and your son. Really. Really, we mean it. We really, really mean it.
- in one scene we see a light on the phone downstairs less than two feet from one of Jessica’s captor’s eyes. Doesn’t her captor ever see this light on through the other 45+ minutes of time Jessica is talking to Ryan?
- in a struggle with one of her captors, Jessica displays an uncanny amount of medical knowledge for somebody who works at the bank. Where did Jessica learn so much about human anatomy? (I believe there was some very quick explanation uttered by her, but I didn’t quite catch what it was).
- why is Jessica’s husband such a wimp? He has only one moment where he really fights back … the rest of the time he’s getting his butt kicked.
- when Ryan is running low on his cell phone battery he goes to implausible extremes to get a charger from the store, but it does provide a couple cheap laughs.
- William H. Macy is a very good actor and makes the best of what is a mostly preposterous script. Thank goodness he was cast in this movie!
- The lawyer who wants to sue everybody (complete with a license that says something like: sue you 2) has some really funny lines (played by Rick Hoffman). He gets his snazzy blue Porsche stolen by Ryan, only to have it impounded, and then he goes to get it out and it’s stolen by Ryan yet again. I will echo the comments from another epinions review of this movie that I’d like to see this guy in more fuller roles than a funny stereotype bystander.

Overall Cellular makes for a barely passable action popcorn movie. The sounds are decent and the camera work is merely competent but nothing just stands out. I felt the movie was a silly, completely unbelievable, action flick (instead of a serious action drama like Diehard with some comedic moments, as was intended) and when I left the theater and started thinking about it to write this review, the experience overall was mediocre. It was, however, much better than talking to a phone solicitor. Grade: C-

Did this post make you go hmm?

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