I went to watch this movie at Star Cineplex the other day with Diyana. I thought with Denzel Washington and John Travolta starring, the movie could at least pack a punch. How wrong I was.

At best, it was mediocre. There was not any interesting subplots or moral issues to ponder about. What happened was that a group of lunatics decided to take a New York subway train and its occupants hostage in a bid to blackmail the city into giving the crooks $10 million. Along came an MTA train dispatcher Walter Garber (Washington) who was, to keep it short, at the wrong place at the wrong time.

I would say the only interesting part of the film was when the psycho leader ‘Ryder’ (Travolta) communicates with Walter via the subway radio link and forms a brief but sick friendship between them. Ryder is a really crazy guy (it was revealed he is a Catholic, omg) who kills for fun and demands that the ransom be paid within 60 minutes or he would kill 1 passenger with every passing minute. At times, he seems like a kind guy who does not want to kill just for the sake of it, but on the other hand, his insane demands make him more like a schizophrenic moron who acts like a baby. Then again he is smart enough to manipulate the situation by profiting massively from the rise of gold prices as New York stock market reacts adversely due to the hostage situation.

Then there was a brief moment where Ryder forces Walter to confess that he took the bribe (Walter was being investigated for alleged bribery). The emotions and highly-charged atmosphere was really good. In order to save the passenger’s life who was held at gunpoint and threatened to be killed by Ryder if he does not confess, Walter had to lie in front of the whole MTA office. That was one emotional scene, I had to admit. Being accused for something he did not do and being forced to admit it because he needed to save somebody’s life – that was a good one.

In a nutshell, The Taking of Pelham 123 is an average thriller. Watch it only if you really have nothing else to do, and you want to see John Travolta act as a lunatic.