The Taking of Pelham 123: MSN Review

Directed by Joseph Sargent, the original Pelham set up an intriguing conflict between Matthau’s lugubrious Garber and Shaw’s clinical Mr Blue that made their exchanges the highlight of the film. (Quentin Tarantino was clearly a fan, having copied the bad guys’ use of colour-coded aliases in Reservoir Dogs.) Washington’s relationship with Travolta, by contrast, does not work so well, largely because they appear to be in very different stories. Denzel, you see, behaves as if he is playing an ordinary Joe in a real-world thriller. His co-star, though, acts as if he’s in Face/Off, delivering a larger than life essay in preening villainy that’s simply too big for the movie.

 

The other problem is the way the action confines Washington to his hi-tech dispatch room and Travolta to a cramped subway car deep underground. You can almost feel Scott itching to bring them together so they can square off face to face, something he eventually achieves by sacrificing all logic and turning Denzel into a reluctant action hero. The original film also managed to put Matthau and Shaw together, but it didn’t have to invite ridicule to do it. Scott, though, can’t resist blowing his wad on a manic, gun-toting finale that punctures the tension he’s spent the previous hour painstakingly developing.

 

Though Pelham is always taut and exciting, you can’t help wondering how it’d have looked had a director with more self-control been behind the camera. Somebody like Ridley Scott, perhaps.