I watched Speed (1994) Saturday night. Great movie - better than I remembered. A thread of thoughts no one asked for

The acting is quite good from all the major players, but so is the writing. The characterization of Jack (Keanu Reeves) is great. The scene where he chases down the exploded bus even though it’s obviously futile is one of the subtler reinforcements that he’s overly persistent.

Another nice character moment is when he manages to get back in the bus after being dragged underneath it and a passenger says “you’ve got big hairy cojones” and he goes “that’s… really gross” and walks away with the passenger saying “can’t even pay him a compliment”

They establish him as competent, serious, and persistent but not perfect (He makes mistakes and his partner is clearly the bomb expert, not him). He’s empathetic, too, with the way he reassures Sandra Bullock’s character. I imagine Reeves gained a lot of fans that year.

Speaking of empathy, there’s a somewhat unexpected deep conversation when he and Bullock talk about seeing someone die and feeling relieved it’s not you and then shame for thinking that.

But of course it’s an action movie so the real meat is the action sequences, which are great… except for the obviously ridiculous “bus jump”. But if you let that one go it’s just stellar. Perhaps weird to notice, but the explosions are just top notch too.

It’s fun how the premise brings so much tension to things that should be boring, like *making a right turn* and *traffic*.

So anyway. Thanks for reading this thread of things I think about after watching a movie but usually never get to tell anyone.