Unstoppable is a 2010 American disaster action thriller film directed and produced by Tony Scott, written by Mark Bomback, and starring Denzel Washington and Chris Pine.

It is based on the real-life CSX 8888 incident, telling the story of a runaway freight train and the two men who attempt to stop it.

Believing it’s coasting, yardmaster Connie Hooper orders Dewey and Gilleece to pursue the train and sends lead welder Ned Oldham ahead in his truck to switch it off the main line.

Attempts by Dewey and Gilleece to board the train fail, prompting Connie to alert Oscar Galvin, VP of Operations, and coordinate with state police to block road crossings.

Despite Connie's suggestion to deliberately derail the train in unpopulated farmland, Galvin and AWVR's president reject the idea, prioritizing cost-saving measures.

Meanwhile, veteran engineer Frank Barnes and rookie conductor Will Colson are moving freight cars with locomotive 1206 going north on the same line as Triple 7.

Frank notices an open coupler on Triple 7's rear car and proposes coupling 1206 to it, using their brakes to slow it down before it reaches the Stanton curve.

[16] Washington declined and, although attached since April,[17] formally withdrew from the project in July, citing lost patience with the film's lack of a start date.

Filming took place in a broad area around there including the Ohio cities of Martins Ferry, Bellaire, Mingo Junction, Steubenville, and Brewster,[20] and in the Pennsylvania cities of Pittsburgh,[21] Emporium, Milesburg, Tyrone, Julian, Unionville, Port Matilda, Bradford, Monaca, Eldred, Mill Hall, Turtlepoint, Port Allegany, and Carnegie,[22] and also in Portville, New York and Olean, New York.

[25][26] The real-life bridge and elevated curve in the climactic scene is the B & O Railroad Viaduct between Bellaire, Ohio and Benwood, West Virginia.

Two of the train's tank cars contained thousands of gallons of molten phenol, a toxic ingredient used in glues, paints, and dyes.

Once the runaway was slowed down to 11 miles per hour (18 km/h), CSX trainmaster Jon Hosfeld ran alongside the train, and climbed aboard, shutting down the locomotive.

CSX ended up having to bus the safety train's 120 passengers back to the cities at which they had boarded, including Bowling Green, Findlay, and Kenton.

"It's predictably exaggerated and dramatized to make it more entertaining," wrote David Patch, "but close enough to the real thing to support the 'Inspired by True Events' announcement that flashes across the screen at its start."

The site's critical consensus reads, "As fast, loud, and relentless as the train at the center of the story, Unstoppable is perfect popcorn entertainment—and director Tony Scott's best movie in years.

[58] Rolling Stone's Peter Travers—despite a confessed initial skepticism, and giving it only three stars—found that "Your head will spin... palms will sweat... nerves will fry," calling the film "a bang-up ride that [will] wring you out.

"[59] Midwest Film Journal reviewer Nick Rogers concurs: "a terrific thrill ride" and "nail-biting fun," with "sobering steel-city woes... blue-collar anxiety," uplifted with "can-do optimism and work ethic.

While the film's action scenes "have the greasy punch of a three-minute heavy-metal guitar solo", its critic felt the characters were weak.

It called the film "an opportunistic political allegory about an economy that's out of control and industries that are weakened by layoffs, under-staffing, and corporate callousness.

"[61] The New York Times' Manohla Dargis dismissed it as "largely forgettable," with "transitory... pleasures, limited to the actors... and... moments of beauty [or] strange comedy."

But it credits "cinematographer Ben Seresin and... ace sound technicians" for creating "an unexpectedly rich world" of trains and landscapes.

Scott, said "the charm of this movie... is its simplicity," focused on "an engineering problem... solved at top speed... by... a handful of professionals"—calling the film's "absorption in practical matters... exhilarating"—praising its absence of "subtext... larger meaning... political implications or psychological mystery.

"[63] Director Quentin Tarantino highlighted the film in a January 2020 episode of the Rewatchables podcast, and included it in his list of the ten best of the decade.

[66] The editor of railroad industry journal Railway Age — having only read press releases and previewed the movie trailer — panned it as having "...stretched the truth for dramatic effect... [to produce] an entertaining diversion from reality... highly exaggerated.

"[68] Upon its debut, Unstoppable promptly took the box-office lead in 40 countries around the world, with an $18.2 million opening weekend—premiering as the most successful film that weekend in China, Taiwan, Hong Kong and Malaysia—coming in second in North America and Germany.