After his turn in Star Trek, the universe opened up to Chris Pine in more ways than one. But it looks as if he’s content to get back to terra firma and…hop a train? That”s the story according to Variety as Pine is set to join Denzel Washington in the upcoming Unstoppable. In the Tony Scott-directed drama, Pine will portray a young conductor who jumps into a locomotive with an experienced engineer (Washington) in chase of a runaway train that carries a cargo of toxic chemicals. Pic is loosely inspired by real events, and Mark Bomback wrote the script. Pine apparently turned down several other roles after the Deja Vu duo sat down with him and had dinner.
Washington and Scott must have had a blast working around trains in The Taking of Pelham 123 for them to jump right to another movie about them. Unstoppable will be their sixth collaboration in a string of movies going back to Crimson Tide in 1995. As for Pine, he can officially consider himself breathing A-list air as Star Trek was a big success and he can at the very least milk convention appearances for the rest of his life. I did like his work in the film, though, and look for good things to happen to him. He’s also doing a public service in bringing back the runaway train drama, which has been sorely under-represented as a genre lately.
Wonder if Tony Scott could call up a certain Enemy of the State villain and get him on board another one…