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Perhaps the biggest problem with this latest Pelham adaptation is the plot twist that gets revealed near the end of the film. It's a plot twist entirely fabricated for the motive, presumably by screenwriter Brian Helgeland The idea that Travolta's Ryder character would have planned the hijacking to make a killing in the commodities market sounds interesting. In theory, during times of crisis, the stock market falls and yes, people could theoretically plan a terrorist attack to "buy low and sell high" once the market recovered, but the events illustrated here seem kind of ridiculous. Today's market is way too unstable to be able to predict how business is going to react to the hijacking of one subway car in Manhattan. Also - the hijacking took place in the afternoon and by the end of the day, Travolta's Ryder had made six figures or more - in a single day. The way such things are regulated, there's no way he - a guy we find out is an ex-con - could have collected on that kind of money without an extensive investigation. To be fair, the stock market thing was relatively minor to the rest of the plot. The center of this movie is really the relationship between Garber and Ryder. Hitting with only one of two performances, the film is only half good.

The Verdict

Freedgood/Godey's novel was a dark look into the nature of socio-economic relations in one of the world's largest cities during a hostage crisis. The first film based on it was a watered-down version of the story that nevertheless held to its central themes and maintained the gritty New York feel of the book. The latest film adaptation updates the story for a world complete with the Internet, computer laptops and a post-September 11th view of New York as the kind of resilient city that accepts its flaws and stands together in a crisis. While not exactly in the spirit of the book, it IS an interesting mutation on the feel of the 1970s originals. Nowhere does this work better than with Denzel Washington as Walter Garber - now a former bigwig with the Transit Authority who has been handed the job of dispatcher. The reluctant heroism of a fallen civil servant who must risk his life to redeem himself is interesting, but it's not enough to make the film the kind of brilliant update that it would need to be in order to live up to the story that inspired it.

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