A cool million was the ransom demanded by Mr. Blue for the safe return of the seventeen hostages in the front car of a New York subway train.
After the last couple of 70’s movies, I fell into a fog of nostalgia and started thinking of other movies of that period that I have enjoyed enough to revisit, The Taking of Pelham One Two Three bubbled right to the surface. I’m sure I saw it in theaters, rented it on VHS from Blockbuster and possibly caught on TV too. Checking IMDB I found that it was available on MGM+ and for $6.99 a month. So, I signed up and after watching this movie possibly find some others that might be worth a look.
It starred Walter Matthau, but the movie was packed full of 70s stars. First up was Mr. Blue, Robert Shaw (Quint of Jaws), he’s the leader of the gang of 4 who hijack the train. His accomplices included Martin Balsam (Juror #1 of 12 Angry Men) as Mr. Green who is the only survivor of the baddies in the end. I just looked at his IMDB page and he was credited with 179 roles in movies and TV from 1949 to 1997, with 51 credits in the 70s alone. Other recognizable names included Hector Elizondo, Jerry Stiller and Doris Roberts.
Turns out, there are 2 other versions of The Taking of Pelham One Two Three. The first was a TV movie in 1998 which I knew about and a theatrical release in 2008 that I didn’t. Coincidentally, both movies were available on MGM+.
I remembered being excited for the TV version, but was so disappointed in it that I shut it off after about 30 minutes. It didn’t hold a candle to the original even though it was chock-a-block full of stars of the day, Edward James Olmos, Vincent D’Onofrio, Donnie Wahlberg and Richard Schiff. Also, Mr. Olmos’s was Lorraine Bracco, Tony Soprano’s shrink, Dr. Jennifer Melfi. I tried to watch it again this afternoon, but failed. Partially because it still paled in comparison, but also its aspect ratio was off, it seemed a version that was tweaked for High Def TV after being filmed in standard definition. I did watch as far as the initial hijack of the car and then fast forwarded to the end to see if they kept the perfect ending (they did.)
Because of today’s windy, rainy, 40-degree temp weather, I was inside with time to kill, so I looked at the third version. Wow, what a hot mess. I repeated the previous procedure and watch the initial hijack and zipped to the end for the finish which was, well, WTF. It too, had some big stars and some other big-name folks too, including James Gandolfini, the afore mentioned Tony Soprano.
After scrolling thru the movies available on MGM+ I realized there was only a couple things besides The Taking of Pelham One Two Three worth spending money on, luckily when I signed I up I’m entitled to the first week free, so after watching the next couple things, both music documentaries, in my queue I’ll just cancel. First up is San Francisco Sounds: A Place In Time about the music that came from Haight Ashbury in the 60s and 70s. The other covers basically the same time frame, but its Los Angeles based, called Laurel Canyon: A Place In Time.