Movie Review: Unstoppable

3-1/2 stars out of 5
Unstoppable is a film that wants you on the edge of your seat but doesn't quite get you there. Maybe the problem is that I saw it right after I saw 127 Hours, and that's a film that essentially pastes you to the edge of your seat. The tension is 127 Hours is relentless and gripping. Unstoppable is too predictable to cause much anxiety but that doesn't keep it from being fun to watch. How can you not like something Denzel Washington is in? He's a likable, reliable, watchable actor and you can't help but root for him.
Rosario Dawson is pretty good as the yard master although her part could have been cut with no noticeable effect on the movie. If they give Oscars for wrapping up your hair in a ponytail, pulling out the band, then doing it back up again, she gets it. That's mostly what she does, I guess to show tension or something.
The story is fairly unbelievable, like when the Denzel Washington character is running across the top of the train as it's speeding down the tracks, jumping from car to car (photo above). Yeah, right. But the unbelievability didn't bother me. It was an entertaining way to spend an hour and a half and isn't that what a movie's supposed to do?