PLOT
Premium Rush: A hotshot messenger, Gordon-Levitt takes delivery of an envelope that a dirty cop named Bobby, played by Michael Shannon of Boardwalk Empire fame, covets. A wild bike chase ensues.
Quicksilver: A hotshot stockbroker turned messenger, Bacon must employ his financial acumen to save his pals from drug dealers. A wild bike chase ensues.
MONEY QUOTE
Premium Rush: 鈥淔ixed gear, no brakes. Can鈥檛 stop, don鈥檛 want to.鈥
Quicksilver: 鈥淚 go as fast as I like. Street sign says one-way east, I go west.鈥
EPIC STUNT
Premium Rush: Gordon-Levitt dismounts, slides under a flatbed truck, and remounts without missing a beat.
Quicksilver: Bacon bike-dances with a sexy chick in a leotard in his gigantic loft apartment.
BIKE
Premium Rush: Track bike with bullhorn bars that emits inexplicable freewheel sound and turns into a trials bike for parking-garage stunt scenes.
Quicksilver: Track bike with drop bars that emits inexplicable freewheel sound and turns into an artistic-cycling bike for steamy bike-dancing scene.
WARDROBE
Premium Rush: Haute 鈥渇akenger,鈥 complete with messenger bag, minimally vented helmet, and chain lock around Gordon-Levitt鈥檚 waist.
Quicksilver: Helmet? Pshaw! Bacon wears a beret.
VERDICT
Premium Rush: A few years too late鈥攖hanks to Internet delivery services, you鈥檇 be hard-pressed to find an actual messenger these days.
Quicksilver: High art from a golden age when the stock market was soaring, there was no such thing as email, and a bike messenger could afford a giant loft apartment.