FAQ

Originally some hoods come onto the train and harrass the passengers, revealing details about who's making up this random sampling of riders. They particularly abuse a gay man, which was not a usual character type prior to this era that also gave us Dog Day Afternoon. When I rented it later from Blockbuster that segment was gone. Back then, Blockbuster's size could force distributers to censor movies to get lucrative PG-13 ratings for families, eg, no gays on subways.

Four men, who go only by the names Mr Blue (Robert Shaw), Mr Green (Martin Balsam), Mr Gray (Hector Elizondo), and Mr Brown (Earl Hindman), hijack New York City's Pelham 1:23 subway train, take 17 passengers plus the conductor as hostages, and demand $1 million dollars in ransom, and they want it in exactly one hour or they will execute one hostage each minute that the money is late. Lt Zachary Garber (Walter Matthau) of the NYC Transit Police must negotiate with the hijackers, contend with City Hall red tape, and try to identify the hijackers and figure out how they intend to escape, since they are in a tunnel surrounded on all sides by police.

The Taking of Pelham One Two Three (aka The Taking of Pelham 123) is based on the 1973 novel (same title) by American author Morton Freedgood, writing under the pen name of John Godey. The novel was adapted for the movie by American screenwriter Peter Stone. There have since been two remakes: The Taking of Pelham One Two Three (1998) (a television release) and The Taking of Pelham 123 (2009).

"Pelham" refers to a local Manhattan train that departs from Pelham Bay Park. The 1-2-3 refers to the time that it leaves: 1:23.

The dead man feature is a device built into the train that requires a motorman's hand to be pressing the throttle at all times. If it's released, the train stops cold.