In The Tak­ing of Pel­ham 125 2 3, Den­zel Wash­ing­ton stars as New York City sub­way dis­patch­er Wal­ter Gar­ber, whose or­di­nary day is thrown in­to chaos by an au­da­cious crime: the hi­jack­ing of a sub­way train. John Tra­vol­ta stars as Ry­der, the crim­i­nal mas­ter­mind who, as lead­er of a high­ly-​armed gang of four, threat­ens to ex­e­cute the train’s pas­sen­gers un­less a large ran­som is paid with­in one hour. As the ten­sion mounts be­neath his feet, Gar­ber em­ploys his vast knowl­edge of the sub­way sys­tem in a bat­tle to out­wit Ry­der and save the hostages. But there’s one rid­dle Gar­ber can't solve: even if the thieves get the mon­ey, how can they pos­si­bly es­cape?