The Taking of Pelham 1 2 3

I am not one of those film-nerds who protests at great length and in great detail when one of his favorite films is remade -- which is to say that in fact I am -- and yet, the worst thing I can say about Tony Scott's re-make of the 1974 action B-movie classic The Taking of Pelham One Two Three is that it's a pleasant enough way to spend two hours watching things get tense, move fast and blow up. That's it; that's all.

The new Pelham isn't even bad; it's expensive, impressive, full of good actors in parts large and small. But while it has the plot of the original -- where a man-with-a-plan criminal (Travolta here, Robert Shaw in the original) takes a New York City subway train hostage and a civil servant in the subway system's offices (Denzel Washington here, Walter Matthau in the original) winds up being the point man in the city's response to the crisis. The biggest difference between the new and old versions of the story isn't in the changes screenwriter Brian Helgeland (Payback, L.A. Confidential) makes in the script or the camera style of director Tony Scott (Crimson Tide, Enemy of the State); it's that the original Pelham felt like a great New York story with a crime movie inside it, while the new Pelham feels like a perfectly average crime film that happens to take place in New York. You will not be talking about The Taking of Pelham 1 2 3 around the water cooler on Monday; you may not even feel the need to talk about it around the water fountain right after you see it.

And while it's easy to make fun of Tony Scott's directorial style -- if you hired Scott to take your family Christmas card portrait, he'd need three helicopters, five miles of dolly track and a team of pyrotechnicians to make sure it looked 'real' when he blew up your dog -- the fact is that he knows how to make material like this. The quick cutting has been honed in films like Enemy of the State and Top Gun; the mano-a-mano conflict between Washington and Travolta is just a grimmer spin on Crimson Tide's clashes and conflicts; his relationship with Washington built up through films like Deja Vu and Man on Fire. Scott's a soulless technician -- his movies lack the big, brawny brutality of his brother Ridley's more singular visions like Blade Runner and Gladiator--- but he's a superbly competent one.

Which again, sounds like damning with faint praise, but, hey, that's all this version of Pelham deserves. Travolta is wicked, wigged-out and wild as the mysterious Mr. Ryder, and I even like the effort (if not the execution) that Helgeland puts into taking Ryder's plan beyond the simple hostage scheme of the original. Washington doesn't just show up here, either; he does a nice job of muting his normally natural star-power to play a regular guy, warts and all, keeping his voice and manner ordinary even in the jaws of danger. And James Gandolfini, playing the lame-duck multimillionaire mayor of New York, turns what could have been a small part into big, funny stuff. ("Mr. Mayor, are you a Yankees fan?" "No ... I mean, yes, of course. ...")

But the original is nearly a perfect film -- from the score to the bleak bloody humor of it to the title (That smooth One Two Three sets the tone for the bad guy's plan's slow, deliberate unfolding, doesn't it?) to the way it captured how New York City worked (or, rather, seemed to capture -- I was five when the original came out, and only saw it years later) in the throes of a crisis, and how, really, every day is a crisis in the city that never sleeps but could sure use a nap. The new spin tries to work as a post-9/11 variation on the original, but even that's far better handled in the excellent, overlooked Inside Man, which also gave Washington a flashier -- not better, but flashier -- role. The new Pelham takes great pains to inject some moral ambiguity into a story that really doesn't need it; I'm sure the richer moral shadings were essential to get Washington on board, but they slow the film down immeasurably, as the express train of the plot takes slow, meandering sidetracks that don't really add anything but shades of doubt to a story that once ran on parallel rails of certainty and clarity.

The Taking of Pelham One Two Three from 1974 was a great movie made by accident, back when movies could still be made as entertainment for grown-ups -- cynical, funny, thrilling, blunt, profane, well-made and with an emphasis over everyday reality over special effects. (There's more kinetic energy on-screen in the new film's trailer, with its shots of cars vaulting into the air over and over, than there is in the entirety of the '74 film.) It wasn't great but it was good -- so good, in fact, that it's been remade twice since it came out. Looking at Tony Scott's modern take -- with great actors and new twists and great camerawork and newfangled effects -- I didn't dislike it, but I also can't imagine anyone knocking themselves out to remake it in 35 years time, either. The old-school The Taking of Pelham One Two Three takes you by the throat; this new one, well-made as it is, just takes you for granted.

Comments

[Jason]

Here's a question, James. How recently have you watched the original? I've never seen either, but this post sounds like someone remembering the past overly fondly. Not to sound condescending (this is an honest question), but could it be that the reason this movie didn't hit as hard for you is because everything in it has been done before, while in the original it was all fresh and new? I could be wrong.

If that's not the case, then it sounds like the original wasn't an action movie but a "psychological thriller." One that Scott (an action movie director) transformed into an action movie.

[James Rocchi]

Jason -- a good question, and the answer is "As recently as Oct. 2007." (Thanks, internet! See http://rocchireport.com/?p=482 for more ...) And it's not that the '74 is a psychological thriller even; it just has that little oomph of something extra in a lot of places, and the new one tries but lacks that. Like I'm saying, the new one isn't *bad*, but Inside Man has the flair, funk and fun that the original Pelham has and this one forgoes in favor of flash, fury and frenzy.

[Jason]

Ahhh. Gotcha. Sounds like the Thomas Crown Affair. The original was amazing and the remake, well, it wasn't.

[Larry Gonka]

Why must every character in Pelham 123 repeatedly shout the "f" word. All that low-life language just took away from the movie.