Tony Soprano Takes on PELHAM

I commented last week that James Gandolfini should be in that new HBO cop show, but having him play the mayor in a movie? Now that's a bit far fetched, but not so much. If he were to run for mayor of New York for real, I think people would actually vote for him.

If it's starring Denzel then I'm there to see this flick. Plus, David Koepp? Sounds good to me.

I don't remember the character of the mayor from the original film-now that I think about it I think it was the Ed Koch look-alike guy who has played a ot of NYC mayors, but this is a good reason to go back and rewatch the 1974 version.

If you've never seen it, it's a definite must see. It's a great little pot boiler of a film with Walter Matthau as a NYC detective (or maybe he's a transit cop I forget exactly) who spends a lot of the film trying to negotiate with the hijackers and figure out how to catch them. Robert Shaw plays the head of the kidnappers all of whom have names like Mr. Brown and Mr Blue and so on, I suppose the inspiration for the same bit in "Reservoir Dogs" which this could be the "prequel" of.

The ending is really great as are some of the scenes where the cops are racing through NYC with the ransom money to try to keep the hijackers from killing another hostage. Matthau is wonderful as the hangdog cop who acts dumb but is smart like a fox.

Put it at the top of your Netflix queue. It's a five-star thriller.

I am hoping against hope that Tony Scott doesn't go so far over the top in his directing this time around like he has in his last few films. I would rather see a film directed similar to Crimson Tide than the crazy antics of Domino.

Another sign that Hollywood has no original ideas. The original movie was perfect. It was an adequate interpretation of the novel. A tv movie version was made a few years ago and it sucked.

Ok, I COMPLETELY misread the title at first glance and thought Gandolfini was going to be fighting a really bad cold...

...hopefully the marketing folks don't get a typo when they're making posters...