The Taking of Pelham One Two Three (also known as The Taking of Pelham 1 2 3) is a 1974 American crime drama film directed by Joseph Sargent, produced by Gabriel Katzka and Edgar J. Scherick, and starring Walter Matthau, Robert Shaw, Martin Balsam, and Héctor Elizondo. Peter Stone adapted the screenplay from the 1973 novel of the same name written by Morton Freedgood under the pen name John Godey. The title is derived from the train's radio call sign, which is based upon where and when the train began its run; in this case, the train originated at the Pelham Bay Park station in the Bronx at 1:23 p.m. For several years after the film was released, the New York City Transit Authority would not schedule any train to leave Pelham Bay Park station at 1:23. The film received critical acclaim and holds a rating of 100 percent on Rotten Tomatoes, based on 41 reviews. Several critics called it one of 1974's finest films, and it was a box office success. As in the novel, the film follows a group of criminals taking the passengers hostage inside a New York City Subway car for ransom. Musically, it features "one of the best and most inventive thriller scores of the 1970s". It was remade in 1998 as a television film and was again remade in 2009 as a theatrical film. Plot In New York City, four men wearing similar disguises and carrying concealed weapons board the same downtown 6 train, Pelham 1-2-3, at different stations. Using the codenames Mr. Blue, Mr. Green, Mr. Grey, and Mr. Brown, they take 18 people, including the conductor and an undercover police officer, hostage in the first car. Communicating over the radio with New York City Transit Police lieutenant Zachary Garber, Blue demands a $1 million ransom to be delivered exactly within one hour or he will kill one hostage for every minute it is late. Green sneezes periodically, to which Garber always responds, "Gesundheit". Garber, Lt. Patrone and others cooperate while speculating about the hijackers' escape plan. Garber surmises that one hijacker must be a former motorman since they were able to uncouple the head car and park it down the tunnel below 28th Street. Conversations between the hijackers reveal that Blue is a former British Army Colonel and was a mercenary in Africa; Green was a motorman caught in a drug bust;