The Taking of Pelham 123 – A Comedy-Thriller that pleases you

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The Taking of Pelham 123 is a nice movie. Its a movie set in the contemporary world, with make-believe characters and perhaps makes fun of almost everything going on in the world these days. It is also a remake of a 1974 movie by the same name, both are based on a novel by the author John Godey.

The Taking of Pelham 123 is a movie about a Wall Street Broker ‘Ryder’ (John Travolta) gone rogue and orchestrating the hijack of a subway train – Pelham 123. With this he makes the stock market crash and later on makes windfall gains. Since the hijacking of the subway, he is talking to the MTA Dispatch Officer Walter Garber (Denzel Washington), who is a nice guy but undergoing investigation for taking bribe. He turns out to be the true Hero NYC needed at the right moment and saves the day. Yes, makes for a fine story. But for the implementation.

With its witty humor and puns on the world today placed very nicely, the first half of the movie is fast paced and raises a lot many expectations. Its the second half that falters and ruins the fun for you. Its slow, dull and intolerably stupid.

For example, a guy is accidentally streaming live footage from the subway on to his website, which the MTA guys find out and are watching. But the media hounds get no drift on it. Its on the World Wide Web!!! Ryder keeps looking for news here and there over the web, comments on the mayor’s suit but cant find that live stream. Or the whole fetching-money fiasco, which is part of the script. At times you wonder, if this is a thriller movie or a comedy-thriller. Yes, why not? Tony Scott can re-invent a genre, right?

Performances by Denzel Washington and John Travolta are crisp and flawless, as usual. Shouldn’t expect anything less from these two. And that is one thing that makes the movie tolerable. The editing sucks at times and so does the directorial liberties taken in the flow of the script. At times its fast paced and at times its a complete drag.

The movie scores a 53% on the Tomatometer (Rotten Tomatoes) and an average vote of 6.8 on IMDB. According to us, its a movie you’d definitely want to keep in your DVD collection.