The Taking of Pelham 123

From the opening credits of rushing camera shots of New York traffic and Jay-Z's '99 Problems' as an accompanying soundtrack, to the predictable final stand-off between transit worker Walter Garber (Denzel Washington) and ex-banker 'Ryder' (John Travolta), Tony Scott's rehash of the original 1974 classic feels like taking a bite out of a Styrofoam pie. It exudes promise and potential, but lets itself down quicker than a tyre in a field of tacks once you've barely passed the pirate copying disclaimer.

The gritty, claustrophobic atmosphere that made the first movie such a compelling watch has been completely amputated from the 2009 version and replaced with unconvincing street thugs and enough unnecessary swearing to keep Gordon Ramsay topped up until next winter. Denzel maintains an almost plausable yet muted performance, but it's not enough to hold up the rest of the movie.

Played out in a New York subway train, Travolta's character Ryder, holds the passengers for a ransom of $10,000,000 with Garber playing the everyday Joe who finds himself in the high-pressure position as negotiator and confidante to Ryder who rants and strops his way through the movie like a spoilt child in a toy store, making ridiculous demands (at one point insisting the mayor bring the ransom money down in person) and makes shooting hostages seem like an inconvenient chore, huffing and puffing like someone's just asked him to take the bins out after he's just taken his shoes off.

Robert Shaw who plays Ryder's equivalent 'bad guy' role as Mr Blue in the original, was unnervingly polite and polished and a well spoken gentleman, calling the hostages 'Sir' and 'Madam', which made it profoundly more jarring when he would have to take one out and execute them. Ryder on the other hand, is about as menacing as a tattooed thug should be, so it really comes as no surprise when he starts shooting people in the face and in fact, is almost expected of him.

It's possibly not fair to make so many comparisons to the original; after all, thirty-six years have passed and a lot has changed. We have the internet, rap music, airbags and Katie Price. You can't really hope to make the same impact using a faithful reproduction of the original and for it still to hold some context in the modern world. That being said, this could have been vamped up in so many other (more effective) ways. The attempts to modernise this thriller seem transparent and merely cosmetic and no real attempt has been made to adjust to a more modern commentary so it comes off as a meaningless no-strings thriller. If that's for you, you can shelve it next to your Mission Impossible and Bad Boys DVD's, but you'll be disappointed if you were expecting something more.