An awesome and ridiculous film that leaves you thrilled beyond the point of your natural endurance
2012
Theatre
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Music
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Always been a fan but never seen them live. I was ecstatic to be part of this epic event. WOW!
London,
Derek Malcolm's rating
Reader rating
Dir: Tony Scott.
Cast: Denzel Washington, John Travolta, Luis Guzman, Victor Gojcaj, Brian Haley, John Benjamin Hickey
Description: Criminal mastermind Ryder and his gang hold a carriage full of terrified commuters hostage on the subway system and demand $10 million ransom. For every minute the money is late, one of the passengers must die. Veteran transit dispatcher Walter Garber reluctantly accepts the role of hostage negotiator, talking to Ryder and noting down his demands via the train's two-day radio system.
Country: US. 2009. 105mins
Tube trouble: John Travolta causes a minor delay during an underground hold-up
Tony Scott’s remake of the semi-classic of 1974 begins and ends badly. The opening credits are shot in such an overwrought style that you’re not sure what’s happening. Then, 100 minutes later, the final confrontation between hero and villain is absurd.
In between is a reasonably slick thriller in which subway worker Walter (Denzel Washington) and psychotic crook Ryder (John Travolta) do battle over a hijacked train full of terrified passengers, both actors substituting competently for Walter Matthau and Robert Shaw in the original.
Scott secured unprecedented access to the New York subway and uses it almost as a secondary character. He also has the benefit of a halfway decent screenplay from Brian Helgeland, of LA Confidential fame. At one point, James Gandolfini, as the ruffled Mayor of New York, says, “I left my Rudi Giuliani suit at home.”
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Not much else is funny as Walter tries to save the passengers by engaging Ryder in long-range conversation. Travolta is truly nasty as the criminal — a financial wizard who intends to put the ransom into a stock that’s going to double — and Washington plays the hero without seeming too much like a star pretending to be an ordinary guy.
Whether it is thrilling depends upon how well you remember of Joseph Sargent’s original, which was slower but more thoughtful and less keen to astonish with its directorial flourishes.
But telling the story straight is never quite enough for Scott. What’s more, I don’t think I’ve ever seen a film in which women play a smaller part. This is not exactly a buddy-buddy movie but the least you can say for its male-oriented cast of mind is that it moves, and it moves pretty fast.
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I love Denzel in almost everything he has done. However, i loved the original of this film and although both Washington and Travolta give credible performances, i do think the original is much much better.
- Maya - London, London
This is not the first remake - there was ludicrously pc version made for television in 1998 starring Edward James Olmos.
Lovers of truly bad films will watch open-mouthed at this travesty of the original.
Hopefully Channel 4 or Five will seek it out ( it'll probably cost them a tenner ) and slip it into a late night slot.
- Jargonaut, South London
Why bother? The original is a classic, which improves every time you see it.
- Mdj E10, london uk
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