On Criterion in September 2021, I watched the original The Taking of Pelham One Two Three. I had seen some of it before, but not in its entirety. It’s a really great thriller, and it’s amazing to see how influential it was later to other movies, I could see Speed, Reservoir Dogs, and Die Hard sharing its DNA. I like how rough the movie looks, having that 70s New York City grime, and how everyone looked like a regular person, not a movie star, everyone was very average-looking that felt accurate to New York.
I think the remake is ok, but couldn’t stand John Travolta as the villain. Whereas Robert Shaw had more of a quiet psychopath vibe who could pass as a regular person, Travolta just struts into the movie with exaggerated villain facial hair and overacts in his scenes and was awful. Though Walter Matthau and Denzel Washington were both good in playing run-down looking everymen just doing their transit jobs. And in the original film, I thought Martin Balsalm’s character was being played by Burt Young, and didn’t recognize Hector Elizondo or Earl Hindman (Wilson from Home Improvement) at all.
I did like Jerry Stiller a lot, as well as the transit cop hiding in the subway, and how the film gave individual characters to the train hostages, whereas the remake seemed to just treat them as a blob of nobodies. I liked the reveal of which one of the hostages was an undercover cop, the transit team references it but the camera doesn’t linger on anyone enough to give it away.
So I just really enjoyed this tight thriller a lot.
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