Saturday is movie day

It's practically summertime so there are lots and lots of movies opening soon. One of these is The Taking of Pelham 1 2 3 which opens on June 12. It's about guys who hijack New York subway train Pelham 123, hold people hostage, demand money, and escape - but how?. One regular transit dispatcher guy ends up involved. The movie stars famous people (Denzel Washington and John Travolta) and the trailers make it look really exciting and action-y. I'd sort of thought of trying to see it when it comes out, if it got good reviews.

What I didn't know was that this is a (second) remake of a 1974 film: The Taking of Pelham One Two Three, starring Walter Matthau, which was showing tonight on the public tv station. It's a heist movie! Who doesn't love a good heist move? :)

And this is a good heist movie - actually, it's a good movie, period. It's suspenseful and engrossing, with some comic moments thrown to ease the tension. It was interesting to see how the hijackers used their knowledge of the New York subway system and its trains to pull off the job. If you're going to do any kind of heist, it's important to know just how everything works, yes?

The main question throughout is how the hijackers are going to escape and get away with the job. I'm not going to tell you whether they succeed or how it ends - even though the movie has been remade, I don't know whether they'll use the exact same story. They've already changed the title (words representing numbers are so old-fashioned; why not just the numbers instead?) and I hope that they don't change the actual story too much. Being the age that it is, I expect that they'll not only modernize the story to reflect the updated technology, but also add some new twists and turns and stunts. Maybe even an explosion or two.

As long the remake stays a heist movie, it'll probably be ok.