The Taking of Pelham 1-2-3 by Ace

I saw this movie tonight with high hopes and high expectations, but there was something else I witnessed that caught me completely off-guard...

Here's the quick synopsis of the movie:

A gang of armed thugs hopped on a train to take its passengers hostage. The main character development plot is between the leader thug Ryder (John Travolta) and transit traffic controller, Garber (Denzel Washington). It's a high-budget terror movie, designed to arouse the Die Hard fans out there. I would hate to be the one to ruin the movie for you, so more info can be found here: http://movies.yahoo.com/movie/1810003158/info

In my opinion, the movie deserves a 3.5 out of 5.0 stars.

Here's what I liked:

• Character development is pretty solid. The characters are authentic.
• The action sequences are visually smooth. Unlike movies made from the 70s, bullets hitting solid objects looked authentic.
• The Stock Market-related details were accurate, except for the part where the Dow and other major averages dropped over 7% in one session from a terrorist threat. In real life, trading on all exchanges would have been halted. Trading resumes after all threats are eliminated, that's when a gap down of over 7% can occur - only after the market reopens, not while the terrorism is in progress.

Here's what I disliked:

• Excessive use of profanity. I can understand it's for realism, but there were KIDS in the audience! By kids, I mean kids 10 and under. Why were there kids at a rated-R movie? (See below).
• It's a straight movie, meaning, no twisted plot, no role reversals, no backward endings or hidden endings. Nothing that would cause a Ph.D or J.D to think.
• It's overly simple and too many annoying characters.

The future of our children's moral functions remain in the guidance of their parents!

I was appalled (for a lack of a stronger word) by the amount of children under the age of 10 who came to see this movie tonight! I hate making generalizations, but from my observations, all of the kids I saw come from low income households. I even saw a baby nursing in the movie theater!

Come on people!

Don't you think about consequences? Stop the spending on campaigns against drugs, guns, and drunk driving and arrest these "parents" who subject their young ones to disturbingly violent movies this late at night. You'll be doing society a great service for generations to come, trust me! How appalling!

By the way, it's really sad that the people who will read this rant are already privileged while those who need to realize this message could barely afford the electricity in their homes, let alone a computer with internet access.

Hell on Earth, it's what I witnessed tonight. And quite frankly, it was more entertaining than the movie...