SHOCKING:Speed 2’: the movie that almost killed two careers…….Read more

 

 

In 1994, Dutch director Jan de Bont delivered an action movie with a unique twist. Speedtakes the intensity of a car chase and combines it with the suspense of a ticking clock, keeping the tension high for nearly its entire runtime. Keanu Reeves stars as Jack Traven, a bomb disposal expert facing off against jilted ex-cop Howard Payne, played by Dennis Hopper. Sandra Bullock shines in one of her breakout roles as Annie Porter, a civilian forced to keep the bus moving

The film was a surprise hit, grossing around ten times its original budget and becoming the fifth-highest-grossing movie of the entire year. It even won an Oscar, scooping ‘Best Sound’. All this success all but guaranteed a sequel, and lo and behold, that’s exactly what it got three years later. Unfortunately, it was an absolute disaster.

Speed 2: Cruise Control took the logical next step and moved the action from a bus… to a boat. Bullock reprises her role as Annie, on vacation with her new boyfriend Alex (Jason Patric) in the Caribbean. The villainous John Geiger (Willem Dafoe) hijacks the ship they are on and sets it on collision course with an oil tanker. Once again, Annie must thwart the bad guy’s plan by… turning off the autopilot. Compared to her previous task, this is a walk in the park.

Of all the ill-judged sequels to classic movies, Speed 2 ranks up there with the very worst. Despite a massively increased budget, it feels way cheaper than the previous entry, an uninspired knock-off of a genuinely revolutionary film. It was roundly mocked (and rightly so), and it didn’t even convince anyone to go to the cinema, barely making its money back. At least it also won an Oscar… oh wait, no, it actually won the Golden Raspberry Award for ‘Worst Remake or Sequel’, defeating stiff competition in the form of Home Alone 3 and Batman & Robin.

Not only did audiences suffer as a result of this aquatic atrocity, but it almost killed the careers of two great actors, including one who wasn’t in the movie. Reeves declinedthe chance to reprise the role of Draven, which facilitated an awkward off-screen break-up between him and Porter. The actor revealed to GQ that 20th Century Fox put him in “movie jail” for refusing to return to the franchise. He wouldn’t work with the studio again until the 2008 remake of The Day the Earth Stood Still, which was totally worth it and didn’t also almost tank his career…

As for poor Sandra Bullock, she had to suffer through the indignity of actually having her face appear in the wretched thing. “I have one no one came around to, and I’m still embarrassed I was in,” she told Too Fababout some of her career regrets. “It’s called Speed 2. I’ve been very vocal about it. Makes no sense. Slow boat. Slowly going towards an island… That’s one I wished I hadn’t done, and no fans came around, that I know of.”

Luckily, both Reeves and Bullock (and Dafoe, too) managed to escape the curse of Speed 2 and have stellar careers in spite of it. Even so, if you’ve only seen the first film and want to know what happens next, do yourself a favour and just read the Wikipedia synopsis.