Hey there folks. Thanks for checking out our The Taking of Pelham 1 2 3 review.
Director Tony Scott and Denzel Washington are together again (the two have worked together previously on films like Deja Vu, Crimson Tide and Man On Fire) for this remake of the 1974 film which featured Walter Matthau. Everything sounds good so far… except they cast John Travolta as the main antagonist and Travolta isn’t exactly high on many people’s “favorite actor” list these days. I must admit I’m not much of a fan if his either and I thought his casting in this film opposite Denzel was a mistake from a marketing standpoint.
But hold the phone a second. While I readily admit that I don’t find Travolta all that good of an actor these days, I have to confess that whenever he’s cast as the “bad guy” in a movie, I usually end up liking him much more than usual (aside from quite possible the worst movie created in the history of cinema, Battlefield Earth). I loved him in Face Off, I even liked him in Broken Arrow. So maybe he’d fit in Pelham 123?
THE GENERAL IDEA
The synopsis for The Taking Of Pelahm 123 reads something like this: “Tony Scott directs this remake of the Walter Matthau-starring thriller from 1974 with this Columbia Pictures production that pits a transit cop (Denzel Washington) against a group of hijackers lead by John Travolta, who take over a subway train in order to rake in a hefty ransom. David Koepp (War of the Worlds) is adapting the book by author John Godey. ~ Jeremy Wheeler
In “The Taking of Pelham 1 2 3,” Denzel Washington stars as New York City subway dispatcher Walter Garber, whose ordinary day is thrown into chaos by an audacious crime: the hijacking of a subway train. John Travolta stars as Ryder, the criminal mastermind who, as leader of a highly-armed gang of four, threatens to execute the train’s passengers unless a large ransom is paid within one hour. As the tension mounts beneath his feet, Garber employs his vast knowledge of the subway system in a battle to outwit Ryder and save the hostages. But there’s one riddle Garber can’t solve: even if the thieves get the money, how can they possibly escape?”
THE GOOD
One of the key elements to any good heist movie is that you’ve got to have the audience asking themselves the question “how on earth are they going to pull this off”? Or in the case of Pelham 123 “how on earth are they going to get away with it”? Unlike many heist movies, The Taking of Pelham 123 actually begins with the heist (in a sense) with Travolta and crew taking the train and the rest of the movie is a bit of a cat and mouse game that really does have you guessing “how do they plan to get out”. It’s this question that keeps you interested and riveted to the unfolding story and it really was pulled off well.
Denzel Washington continues to amaze me with his ability to take the best, or worst characters on screen and really make them pop. His performance in this film is no exception. Washington wasn’t given the best dialog to work with here, but somehow he finds a way to make this character REAL, sympathetic and we become interested in him due to the performance. This guy really is amazing.
As I mentioned in the beginning, I tend to be a lot more open to John Travolta in a film if he’s playing the antagonist, and I’ve got to say he steals the film. Granted, he had much better material to work with than any other character in the movie, but to his credit Travolta takes advantage of that and runs with the character. He’s intense, insane, smart, and funny at the same time (I think Travolta got all the biggest giggles from the crowd in the movie). Thumbs up.
THE BAD
There is a sub plot in the movie regarding Denzel Washington’s character facing an investigation at work for alleged bribe taking. The story line takes up a considerable amount of the film and it was a total waste. Here’s how I measure it… if you can remove a character or subplot from a movie entirely, and you wouldn’t have even noticed it being gone or if it had absolutely no effect or influence on the main story line… then get rid of it. Oh I realize that Scott was going for a motivation of redemption and exoneration for Washington’s character, but it was completely inconsequential and just took up screen time for literally no reason.
The ending of this movie SUCKS. It’s so horrible it practically undoes any good thing the rest of the film did. It was soooo bad and soooo terrible that even when the credits started rolling I stayed in my seat half expecting the screen to come back on to show more things happening… to show us that the movie didn’t end the way we think it did… so do SOMETHING. But no. A film that built up a satisfying story and sense of tension let it all completely unravel at the end in one of the most unsatisfying endings to a movie I’ve ever seen. Very disappointing.
OVERALL
The Taking Of Pelham 1 2 3 is a pretty good heist film, setting up a good premise and giving us fairly solid characters with a really good villain, that unfortunately bleeds a lot of its energy with a pointless subplot and then completely unravels with a horrible ending. The movie as a whole still kept me moderately entertained for the runtime, but blows it at the end. Overall I give The Taking of Pelham 1 2 3 a 5 out of 10.
