Doomed from the Start: Pelham/Warriors (1/1/09) - Page 2

Thanks for the nomination, Phil.

No, it's cool. I'm not greedy either. I just didn't know how we were doing it.

let's post the next movies on the 15th or 20th to give people a chance to watch or re-watch before the 1st.

Maybe we could just do it organically like it happened last time. Everyone who wants to nominate a double, and the one most people like the idea of we go with?

Again, let me repeat my Kurosawa does Shakespeare nom for Throne of Blood and Ran as a consequence.

Yeah do this: Pelham wasn't easy to track down in Oz so I haven't had the chance to sit down and watch it yet. Chris O. might as well pick the next two.

I watched Pelham a week or so ago. I liked both and the way they caught NYC as the melting pot it is. One of the biggest things I noticed was that the movie character of New York City just doesn't seem as relevant as it once did. There is a lot about both movies that end up defined without needing to be explicitly stated.

That's what I thought was so great about Pelham. They did a great job of capturing the city down to Mayor not wanting to make an appearance cause he knew he'd be booed.

Also funny thing I found out looking it up on IMDB the big guy in the gang. I want to say he was Mr. Gray is played by Wilson Wilson from Home Improvement I thought that was pretty funny.

I never thought about that angle, but you're right. Now it just seems to be fodder for 9/11 references(with the exception of The Wackness, I guess?). It's not as unremarkable of a backdrop as L.A. these days, of course, but it's on its way to seeming sort of inert.

Not to bog this project down with a theme, but the above posts make a strong case to do some sort of "around the world" series of double features. Every month it's two films set in the same city. New city each month. Would certainly get some of us more America-centric viewers off our asses to watch more foreign.

Actually it was while watching The Wackness last night that I thought of it. The only movie I could think of recently that did it well was 25th Hour.

Phil I like that idea, we could even do something where we take an American movie placed in the city/country and one that is more indigenous. When I took African Cinema we did something similar where we started off with Out of Africa before going into movies like the Battle of Algiers.

Okay, then I'll wait on my picks, because I had something else entirely different in mind.

Not much to add actually to the general discussion that hasn't already been said. I think it's awesome that so many people who hadn't really gotten around to seeing THE WARRIORS finally are. Sad that so few of us have the theatrical cut dvd issued a few years ago.

This looks interesting. Especially in light of the near universal disdain for Hill's director cut approach.

The Warriors : The Comic Book Series.



Sadly, no mention of a PELHAM 1 2 3 graphic novel yet.



Amazingly, the video game they made from this was absolutely spectacular. Covering the film narrative and expanding the whole concept into a quasi-sandbox approach that gave some great depth to the whole gang(fuckin' Rembrandt and those goddamned tags!), it proved that when a game producer gives a sincere shit about the idea, they can make a totally workable and successful tie-in. Kudos to them also for the vivid fight scenes and the intense interactivity-I busted a thumbstick unscrewing all those car radios!



I'd also recommend reading Sol Yurick's novel, if you can get your mitts on it. They did a reissue a few years ago and it featured a spanky new twenty page intro by Yorick. Nice details on his efforts to research his book, get the fucker published and the thrill(and heartbreak) of the ultimate cinematic version. It's interesting to hear not only about the obvious Xenophon connections, but his use of Milton as well.

The book is grim, dark and super violent. Also, the title is meant much the same way Watchmen is meant in the Moore gn. It's a term for the boppers in general. The gang is actually The Dominators. And they're all (realistically)black, as opposed the rainbow coalition in Hill's film. The text is terse and aggresive and perfectly reflects the hormone drenched and agnsty universe of inner city gangs in the time Yorick wrote the book.

Phil that's a slice of fried gold right there. Nice one mate.

Yeah I was going to make you guys watch some Australian stuff so I'm cool with a theme thing. Makes it easier to discuss the two films at once.

Hmmmm a Melbourne double, a Melbourne double...

...any of these would work:

Noise

The Magician

Kenny

Chopper (of course)

Romper Stomper

Metal Skin

Proof

Death In Brunswick

Malcolm

...there's some goodies. Thoughts Matt? Am I missing anything major?

Dogs in Space, but I would wager that is nigh impossible for anyone outside of America to get their hands on actually, same with He Died With a Felafel in his hand which has a fantastic depiction of Melbourne despite the film never actually leaving the house.
On the Beach count? That film is worth it just to hear Gregory Peck mention Frankston. Mind: Blown

Yeah theyre both top calls but I can't see them being acquired stateside - not via legit channels anyways.

Whichever movies you guys decide please think of us international non-Netflix having plebes. Finding Pelham in Greece was hard enough and I don't have enough spare cash right now to import everything.

I can at least say that, living in the third largest Greek city in the world, greek films are at least easy for Matt and I to track down if we end up doing a greek double.

Shouldn't you guys have a logistics thread so this one can be all movie talk?

Ok, just wanted to say i was able to get both movies, but i haven't had the time to sit down and watch them yet. I came back from a 10 day vacation and found my TV won't turn on... So i'm trying to wait till i get it fixed, otherwise i'll do my best to watch them on my computer this weekend.!

Exactly. I can't believe all the chat about these two films has been exhausted in less than 50 posts. Yet, folks have yoi-yoied on and on about garbage like TWILIGHT.

PELHAM alone is rife with unbelievable little tidbits that add to it's strength as a rather vivid glimpse of New Yawk in the gradually filthying 70s.

What about Dolph Sweet's vocal cameo? Having him and Kenneth McMillan as cops in one flick is the same kind of daily double as having Bill Smitrovich and Dan Lauria as military types in INDEPENDENCE DAY.

Lee Wallace as the obnoxious "Koch" before Koch. His nice lengthy scene with Tony Roberts(and a much different looking Doris Roberts) as they hem and haw about the ransom is built on that stunning rapid-fire banter. As someone mentioned, it's great to see Tony Roberts in a nice little role outside of playing straight man to Woody Allen. In my mind, his PELHAM character is a relative of the guy he played in SERPICO.

And hey...it's Earl Hindman's whole face!

Like NAKED CITY did with the police, PELHAM gives a fantastic multi-level look at the command and control structure of the transit authority in detail and the city at large. Sure, it's no over-slick Pentagony thriller*, but it's populated by infinitely more human characters. Folks everyone knows in real life. There's that great scene where Matthau finally reaches his threshold with the kvetching Dick O'Neill and slams him down in his chair resulting in a nice spill unplannable in it's authenticity. Not to mention that tour-de-force of facial acting when Matthau realizes the visiting Japanese gentlemen he's been insulting for ten minutes can understand english well enough!


* And I don't mean NO WAY OUT. That film is great in a dozen ways...Will Patton being near the very top of that list. And it makes an awesome double-bill with it's progenitor THE BIG CLOCK.

The whole bit with Matthau and the Japanese guys is just classic. Great build up and they pay the whole bit off before it feels like it's gone on too long. I think it also does a great job of showing how usually mundane his days are before they find out the Pelham got hijacked.

And the stuff with the Mayor is just hilarious. I wasn't expecting to laugh as much as I did. But I think the film does a great of being funny in the midst of the tension.

The Mayor dropping the snot rags on to his house plants was a nice gag. And who knew Doris Roberts was ever young?

I would have stuck to the theme and gone with...

This way, dummies.

Speaking of favorite quotes, this one from Garber always slips under my radar and cracks me up every single time:

"Well, the guy who's talking's got a heavy English accent. He could be a fruitcake."

The final twelve plus of The Warriors is a perfect blend of sound + vision.

Nobody ever answered the posed question regarding the sexual politics of the movie. Fascinating that Ajax and Rembrandt co-exist in the same gang.
Are they oblivious to the implied homosexuality or above caring about it. Like how the character is a part of them, and not a stereotype used as the butt of a joke. (It is hilarious that Rembrandt's gaydar starts going off the chart when they hook up w. the Lizzies)

Been having problems finding the original Warriors, and I really don't want to watch the director's cut first, so I resorted to just seeing Pelham in the meantime.

First things first, this film is really rather brilliant, and I'm glad this thing pointed me towards it.
The film it actually reminds me of the most, oddly, is the original Ealing version of the Ladykillers. The characterisation is obviously dramaticly different, but there's something in the feel of the heist reminsicent of Ladykillers' scenes at at the train station. I'll have to re-watch the older film to remind myself exactly what.

I'll leave any commentary on the New York thing until I've had another go finding Warriors, I think.

What, we're watching porn now?

Also, was Pelham real-time, or only semi-real-time? It didn't occur to me to watch for it until afterwards.

Posted in the wrong thread, but i just saw Pelham 123.

Great movie. Shaw is amazing in it. Mathau was difficult for me to accept at first because i always associated him with comedy roles.
Loved the bureaucratic aspects of it. The mayor and the 3 wise men deciding what to do with the situation and the entire sequence whey they wait for the money.

Loved the deputy Mayor. Everyone played it really low key and it made it really believable.

I'm not that horrified by the idea of a remake. The basic concept is solid enough to support another movie, too bad it's Travolta. Can't hold a candle to Shaw, and he's a fruitcake.

He just lost his son, Tati

I believe it's only semi-real time, but then again I've only seen the movie once, and that was over 5 years ago.

The one time I saw it, though, I enjoyed it a lot, despite all the bitchy characters bitching all the time. I'll have to try and find it at a videostore, or if I have to, purchase it. It's a greatly plotted and suspenseful movie, I do remember that.

The Warriors is certainly goofy, but it's great entertainment. It''s a tough and gritty movie with some nice action sequences. I've seen both the theatrical and director's versions, and I'll echo everyone else's opinions on the latter. I wish the Director's Cut DVD would have had both versions of the movie, but of course, that makes too much sense... at least I found a fan-made version (nevermind how) where it's the theatrical cut and spliced into it is added footage that they included when the movie was shown on channels like the USA Network. The added footage isn't much, but it'd be nice if they would have included it on one of the DVD releases.

Yes. I was surprised at how funny Pelham is. And as has been noted at how straightforward it is - no '70s style directorial tricks (beyond the almost obligatory freeze frame at the end, and what a FANTASTIC freeze frame, thankyouverymuch), no '90s-'00s style "twists," just a crackerjack crime story.

I assume that this springs from the book source, but what makes Pelham great for me is that almost half the movie is about how the City reacts to this major crime - the human details of not only the transportation officials ("you can't run a goddam train station without cursing") but all the way from the patrol cops ("see, I told you we'd take the heat" when the money is late) up to the mayor's deliberations with his staff.

And obviously the '70s New York setting provides these colorful but totally realistic personalities.

By comparison, The Warriors is a fable. I don't mean that in a bad way, but when I saw it as a kid I thought it was this gritty, only-slightly-exaggerated version of New York's underbelly and now, particularly after something like Pelham, it is more apparently just a fun adventure story set in that time and place (the hell with it being in the future).

A quality it shares strongly with it's relative STREETS OF FIRE.

Also, the distinct, Peanuts-like lack of "grown-ups" gives the film that extra oomph on the fairy-tale level. Though much more strongly suggested in Yorick's book, the characters in the film are essentially supposed to be 16 or 17 at the oldest. The blessed few capable of driving tending to carry much more pull within their respective families. Michael Beck was 30 when the film was made, Remar was 26. Though there are a couple of pretty young faces, most suggest grown men rather than hormonal middle-pubes running rampant.


It turned out a friend of mine had never seen THE WARRIORS before, so last evening I watched it with him(I never get tired of seeing it and it made a kooky double-bill bottom with cult-noir DECOY). Anyway, I know I can't be the only soul who gets an emotional rush from the dialogue free scene on the subway train as the survivors of the expedition ride that last leg back to Coney. Particularly, Swan not allowing Mercy to be self-conscious when the two couples from the prom come aboard.

No you're not. This scene and the one where they reach Coney Island and Swan's reaction "We fought all night to come back to this?" pretty much sum up his character for me.

That scene is great; good point about the lack of "adults."

Another Pelham point, did anyone else notice that each hostage is a representative of a 'type: callgirl, young Brother, old Jewish guy, businessman, hispanic woman, single (?) mother with kids, etc.? It's like John Rocker's nightmare in there.

The credits seem to go out of their way to draw attention to it.

I get choked up when Ajax is handcuffed and arrested. The look on his face is heartbreaking!

He always was an idiot.

Pelham's such a talky movie, but still a great example of economical storytelling.

The New York of 1974 is cool (the city was apparently pissed about the film's depiction), but the real draw is this great collection of character actors. Ben Stiller's dad, Julius Harris, every cop and subway official looks and feels "lived in", as opposed to coming off like a bunch of actors dressed up and putting on a show. A great cast, and a mostly dead one.

I thought the scenes with Caz were absolutely terrific, him striding towards the train completely unaware he was marching toward his death was a great moment, poor Caz.

Yeah Caz was my favourite character in the film. Have never seen Pelham before. Fucking Loved it. As economical and taught as it was as a thriller it had a kind of laid back feel to it at the beginning I really dug. The whole WTF? aspect of everyone's initial disbelief at what was going on, including the hostages when they first saw the machine guns was priceless.

New York exists as an almost Mythical City for me, and this is one of the kind of films that helps enrich and add to that idea. The suggestion that The Warriors is a science fiction film actually sits beautifully with me; the big double bill Back In The VHS and Weed days was Escape From New York and the Warriors, so the two films always felt like they belonged in the same universe.
More when Im not so out of it.

I finally got around to seeing Pelham, and while it's pretty much all been covered already, I really liked the movie. As an aspiring screenwriter, it's the perfect example of the kind of things I like to and try to write. Fast paced, fun, economical. Just perfect.

And I've always been a Mathau fan but he's really dynamite in this. Ditto for Shaw.

I've seen bits of warriors many times, lots of my friends bang on about it all the time, a mate's ex used to get drunk and say that line over and over again but I finally rented it and watched it stone cold sober, first thing in the morning from start to finish and I really didn't like it at all. Sorry. Let me just say 1) I'm not trolling 2) Let me finish or just skip the rest of this post 3) if you must call me a cunt for not agreeing with you, do what you feel you must but remember this is a thread for us to discuss these films, which is what I'm doing, I hope we're not just meant to watch them and say "zOMG what a fantastic film".

I just could not engage - the version was the director's cut - which I know has picked up a lot of hate on this (and many many other) thread(s) - I found the message confused and the performances very very poor, I know Hill deliberately went for newer faces but even the 20 somethings should have at least some idea of nuance. I'm not going to turn this into a straight up bash because there were elements that i liked: the comic book aspect seemed unnecessary as it was pretty fucking cartoon anyway but it didn't ruin it for me and made for some interesting cuts. The subway/ prom-kids scene was a joy on first viewing but on re-inspection fell apart a little, why does swan have such contempt for these kids and for mercy? because they didn't join a gang and fuck their lives up? because they are having fun instead of running for their lives? is he jealous? Is he contemplative of his poor choices? Is he resentful of what he considers their poor choices? Does he think that their clothing is garish 70s shit? does he think that his clothing is garish 70s shit? Is he angered by their fear? their pity? The fact that they are meant to be contemporaries slips when it's clear that the prom kids are actually kids whereas Swan et al are adults acting as kids. I found myself wondering what that scene could have been if a load of guffawing drunken 30 or 40 somethings had got on and looked down on the warriors as silly children playing war or better still an actual gang, not some make-up wearing basball players but an actual bunch of bad-ass crack dealing motherfuckers. The absence of 'adults' from most of the film just allows the story to run wildly unchecked.

I see how the movie has influenced subsequent films a great deal (including some of my favourite films - also some of my favourite music - big PWEI fan) but it just left me disappointed (perhaps it had been built up too much). I imagine it was very ambitious and controversial at the time and it's nice to see where some folks got their early break Ruehl, kelly, remar etc. but it seemed too campy and silly to take seriously and it took itself too seriously to take as silly, campy fun.

One last thing, the assasination of Cyrus was a good thing right? Ok, it might have been for the wrong reasons but he was advocating civil insurrection. Of course murder is never a solution (even in movies) but if it had played out and the gangs had taken out the police/ national guard/ government or whatever NY would have wound up becoming an escape from new york kind of hell-hole right? Or the intifada would have been crushed, resulting in the deaths/ arrests of hundreds of fruity gang members. Either way, cyrus had to go, after all he wasn't trying to usher in a new utopia of peace and harmony, he just wanted to be Duke of New York.
Also, the cops were right there at the park, dozens of them, apparently just waiting for it to turn nasty - why weren't they there before busting them for unlawful assembly or concealed weapons or conspiracy to incite or whatever?

It's not futuristic fiction, it's not a gang movie, it's not a message movie, it's not a parody, it's not social commentary, what the hell is it? Perhaps I should read the book to get a handle on the source before revisiting it. If i missed the point, sorry, if i didn't 'get it' tell me what 'it' is.

In contrast i'd seen Pelham123 before and thouroughly enjoyed it again - the power of the performances from Mattau, Elizondo, Stiller, Wallace, Roberts, o'Neill (all of whom would probably be considered by most to be comic actors and therefore somehow less skilled in the eyes of many film snobs), watching these folk weave this story is an absolute joy. But the sinister shaw is the real stand out (i had a hard time convincing my wife that it was the same guy who played Quint in Jaws - and that he came from the same county in the UK as we do- lancashire - lalala). They have an impressive cast for the remake, i hope Tony Scott can rein them all in to deliver something worthy of this. Incidentally I saw an interview with Ben Stiller he said that he was allowed to be backstage for some of the night shoots involving his father (I guess he was about 9 or 10 years old) and it was that experience that inspired him to make movies.

Just finished The Warriors finally.
Never seen it before and yeah, it was a great double feature with Pelham.

The city and the subway network play such a big role, something that can't be replicated today. I loved the concept of the film, it was so simple, yet open to so many great possibilities.
I loved the DJ spreading out the news and the different gangs. But i have to say that the fact that Tits make every person in The Warriors become a 12 year old retard killed the film for me.

Every member of the organized gang seemed to act on his own and only think with their dicks. Specially Ajax, who i was loving till he makes such a stupid mistake.

Also, the leader of the Rogues, the main antagonist was lame as fuck. I found his performance to be incredibly silly and even funny.

I love aspects of the film. But as a whole, it just didn't fully connect.

Great soundtrack!

Well, they were supposed to be hormonal 16 year olds. As I mentioned earlier in the thread, the fact that the cast exudes an older atmosphere tends to dull that point. The Warriors are all varying degrees of maturity, from the infantile to the remarkably responsible. Yet they all qualify as juvenile delinquents. While Swan is the most mature(say as relative to Ajax) he does imply a willingness to take advantage of Mercy. It's only when put in the situation that he backs away and(with a detectable grumpiness on par for a person at the worst point in puberty) acknowledges that he hopes to actually transcend his lot rather than let it dictate his behavior. That he's coldly insulting to Mercy in the process underlines the fact that he's still bound by his meager amount of years and can't quite show affection clearly or willingly. And that's what makes the ending resonate a little more.

Also Ajax displays his shaky reliability and telegraphs the risks in him being brought along(reluctantly for muscle, certainly not diplomacy) before the opening credits are even finished. Like a promiscuous blonde in horror films, his fate is pre-ordained. His friends are wise enough to give him some room and, to their good fortune, avoid him bringing them down with him. After he magnificently proves his worth as a soldier(both in martial skills and esprit de corps) in the group's most trying fight(against The Furies), he is brought down by his achilles heel(one repeatedly advertised throughout the journey).

Besides, I've seen tits make folks act like 12 year old retards elsewhere.