10 Best Joel Schumacher Films
4. Phone Booth
Phone Booth’s central conceit - a man trapped in the titular telecommunications box due to the threats of an external figure - was conceived in the 1960s. Writer Larry Cohen wanted Alfred Hitchcock to direct; Hitchcock was keen, but the idea was never quite ironed out. Cohen couldn’t figure out just why this man was trapped in the booth.
When the script finally came together, Hitchcock had passed on, and there’s an argument to be made that cell phone technology made the whole thing a little redundant - but the idea was well worth digging up all the same. This is a taught thriller that stays just on the right side of plausible, bolstered by sterling work from Colin Farrell.
Phone Booth is a morality play - Farrell’s Stu has been philandering, and unless he changes his ways, the unnamed caller (Kiefer Sutherland) will blow him away. At under 90 minutes, the film smartly resists overstaying its welcome, mining as much tension as it can from its gimmick before getting out of there.
A big deal at the time, Phone Booth isn’t talked about so much these days (likely due to the increasing irrelevance of its setting), but it’s well worth returning to.