You may have heard that Hollywood is remaking "The Taking of Pelham 123" with Denzel Washington as the Walter Matthau character and John Travolta reprising Robert Shaw's role as the lead subway train hijacker. Tony Scott is directing. This is not a positive development.

The original "Pelham 123" is a great film (well maybe not "Maltese Falcon" great, or even "Die Hard" great, but very good), with a terrific cast and possibly the coolest score ever.

Although it's very much a product of its era -- when New York City was just about run into the ground by John Lindsay and Abe Beame, and hitting theaters just a few years before Gerald Ford told the city to "drop dead" -- it's probably shocking to our 21st century PC sensitivities. After all, it was also a time when affirmative action was really just getting under way, when racial and sexual politics were still hot, when government was beginning to lose its veneer as all-beneficent and all-powerful. Maybe that's part of what makes this particular movie a classic.

Below are the trailers for the remake and the original. There is really no comparison. The remake looks like a by-the-numbers caper picture with a by-the-numbers caper picture soundtrack. The original was a crime thriller, and a political satire, and, well, a Walter Matthau-Robert Shaw movie with an original score by David "Night on Disco Mountain" Shire.

I can't begin to imagine how Scott and company will top the original's sly ending. Washington is great -- but only Matthau could pull off the film's final line as he did. (Do I have to give you a spoiler warning with that link? Looks like I just did.)