Features > Movie Reviews > The Taking of…

 (That’s underground as in subway, not Andy Warhol territory, by the way.) Ostensibly based on John Godey’s novel, not Peter Stone’s screenplay for the 1974 film, this adaptation represents an evolution, but not necessarily an improvement.

The plan is essentially unchanged, at least at first. A group of armed men hijack the titular New York subway train. They decouple all but the lead carriage, hole up between stations, and the leader, who calls himself “Ryder” (John Travolta) calmly informs the radio controller that the City has just one hour to cough up a $10 million ransom to secure the lives of the passengers.

On the face of it, it’s a bewildering scheme. Escape seems unlikely. But there’s no question these men mean business. When the Transit dispatcher, Walter (Denzel Washington) is replaced by a professional hostage negotiator (John Turturro), Ryder signals his displeasure by shooting the train driver dead. Walter is returned to his post, too late for his colleague, but still with an outside chance of saving the day.

The first Pelham is remembered for three things: the color-coded criminals (a conceit that Quentin Tarantino ripped off for Reservoir Dogs); a vintage Walter Matthau performance; and the clever kicker.

Scott’s streamlined version – written by Brian LA Confidential Helgeland – axes (i) and (iii) entirely, and substitutes Matthau’s baleful Transit cop with Denzel’s disgraced manager, demoted to the dispatcher’s desk after accusations that he’s taken a bribe.

From this dubious original sin Helgeland fashions a textbook redemptive arc for Walter, and a contrived connection between the civil servant and the crook he immediately pegs as a fellow Catholic. The two men take turns playing priest and penitent, detective and quarry, while Scott desperately tries to rev up the action, crashing several police vehicles as the authorities race the ransom money across town.

A moviemaker who instinctively feels the need for speed (as Tom Cruise put it in Top Gun), Scott isn’t exactly playing to his strengths here. His hyperactive crabbing camera moves don’t so much disguise the talk-talk at the centre of the script as distract from it. The relentless sideways shunting motion becomes such a tic that when a real action sequence presents itself – a runaway train careering down the tracks – Scott contrives to make it look almost inert; as thrilling as a stop light.

More than anything, though, Pelham mark II reflects how New York has cleaned up its act over the last three decades. The racially-obsesssed vernacular of the 70s has gone, for the most part (Travolta lets off a few cracks at the expense of the Italians, but no one else rises to that challenge).

The rank but pungent smell of the old boroughs has given way to scratch-and-sniff references to Terrorists, Wall Street excess and a philandering mayor (James Gandolfini). Perhaps as an unintended side-effect, the colourful character bits fleshed out in the original by stalwarts like Hector Elizondo, Jerry Stiller and Martin Balsam (to name but three) are steamrollered by the new movie’s twin star turns. Even a reliable scene-stealer like Luis Guzman barely gets a word in edgewise as John and Denzel trade call and response.

It’s an uneven fight – but that is by design. Travolta, goateed and tattooed, goes for the jugular, ranting and raging entertainingly, but to diminishing effect. Washington is the tortoise in this race: slow and steady. No prizes for guessing who comes out on top…

Yup. That would be Walter Matthau. As simple as 1; 2; 3.