Movies I Watched Today

[philosoraptor42]

Taking Of Pelham One Two Three
(No, not the remake!)

Oh my god, that was fantastic! Absolutely classic movie. Over Christmas I saw "The Sting" for the first time (which is pretty good) and I think I can honestly say that this movie (released the following year) was better. They share Robert Shaw in common and it has to be said that he is awesome in both of them.

The premise of the movie is that a group of men hijack a subway train and then demand a ransom for their hostages within the train. The whole point, as you might imagine, is that no one would expect anyone to hijack a subway train. Robert Shaw plays the head hijacker in the original and is cool-headed about it.

Looking at the trailer for the re-make it's barely recognisable as the same film. John Travolta, playing the head hijacker shouts and laughs maniacally. Another issue is what Travolta is wearing. In the opening scenes of the original movie, you'd be well advised to take a very careful look at the people on screen, because you will find that there are several very similar looking figures who are actually all different people. In the trailer for the remake, Travolta looks far too obviously like Travolta and no one is going to have any trouble identifying him if he manages to make a successful getaway.

In one trailer there's a rather odd line:
"Are you sure you don't have some sort of relationship with him?"
In another there's an even weirder line from Denzel Washington's girlfriend:
"We need milk, so on your way home I want you to get a gallon."
Denzel replies: "I can get half a gallon" Wtf?

The awesome Dr. Kermode compares the two movies in this little vid here:

Basically it reminds me of the mess they made of State of Play except that there they had the excuse that they were adapting an entire tv series. Here it's more like a Vanilla Sky situation. They take a movie where the ideas, the character interaction and the suspense is all done just perfectly and then they decide to put all the bells and whistles on it making it seem hideously over-produced so it loses it's original charm. Perhaps I'm being a little over-judgemental of a remake I've never seen, but I think my reaction here is testament to how awesome the original was. Far from seeming even remotely dated, it is one of the best movies I have ever seen. In fact it's actually rather remarkable how little it has dated. Comparing it to other favourites of mine from the same era like Day Of The Jackal, The Wicker Man or even Jaws (also starring Robert Shaw) from the following year, it is remarkable how well it keeps up the tension and the pacing (especially when you consider that most of the main characters are confined to a subway train for much of the running time).

So anyway, yes I would have to say that Taking Of Pelham One Two Three (no, not the remake) not only gets (obviously) 5/5 , but it's also one of my favourite movies of all time.

Five Minutes Of Heaven

No, no no! It was going so well.

Basically the first half of the movie is brilliant. It starts by setting up the scenario by showing you exactly what happened in the distant past. If you don't know already I'm certainly not going to spoil it, so to put it simply, the movie involves the violence in Northern Ireland and someone gets shot (what more do you really need to know?). So yeah, fast-forward to the future and one of the characters is the shooter and the other is a relative of the victim. Both are in separate cars making their way to be filmed for a television programme about "reconcilliation". "Is reconcilliation even possible," they ask us? Well certainly the relative of the victim (played by James Nesbitt) is not convinced.

Now it has to be said that I was a little unsure about James Nesbitt. I know him for playing the charismatic, but self-centred Adam in the television programme "Cold Feet". Now, while I'll admit that he was one of the best actors in that show, it doesn't leave me with good memories (because the show had severely jumped the shark by the time the final series came to a close) and Nesbitt's other appearances haven't been spectacular to say the least. However, in this film I can quite happily say that he more than holds his own alongside Liam Neeson (who, let's face it, is awesome) and provides the most amazing performance.

Now, like I said, we follow the movie to a tv set and the whole thing is terribly tense. The way the need for cameras, make-up, lighting cues etc. affect the dynamic of the meeting between the two main characters is very clever. Unfortunately, the movie doesn't really seem sure how to end. Personally, after the incredibly gripping start I felt very let down by the way things moved in the second half. It wasn't that the ending made the movie bad, but that it didn't live up to what came before it. (I was beginning to gasp in delight at my good fortune in seeing two incredible movies back-to-back like this, so when I realised that Five Minutes Of Heaven doesn't remain the gem that it appears to be in the first half that was rather dissapointing.)

So in the end, I'll have to give this 4/5

While the excellent premise isn't used so well in the second half, the performances from the two leading actors remain on top form to the very end.