I can hear the pitch now … why remake when we can make it a sequel?
It’s 2012…and Hank Conway…um, I mean McKenna, now in his mid-60s has arrived in Washington DC to attend the Kennedy Center Honors which is being awarded posthumously to his mother Jo the following evening. After checking into his hotel suite, he telephones his daughter Joanna who is traveling by train to meet him. Joanna has a fear of flying and hasn’t been quite right since the divorce. She travels with her 7 year old son, Ben. Hank tells Joanna he’ll pick them up at the station in the morning.
That night, as the train makes its way toward the nation’s capital, curious little Ben wanders to the empty observation car while his mother sleeps one off. Three foreign speaking men enter and Ben overhears their conversation. Parts of it in English lead him to believe they’re going to murder somebody. Inadvertently, Ben makes a sound and the men know someone is in the car with them.
When Ben goes back to find his mother, she’s vanished! The waiter, the conductors, the other passengers, have no recollection of her being there.
In the morning, Ben arrives to find his grandfather waiting on the platform…as Hank begins to ask where Ben’s mom is, his cell phone rings…
They’re holding Joanna… and she’ll be freed as long as young Ben keeps his trap shut. But being his father’s son, Hank isn’t about to let that stop he and his grandson from recovering Joanna. The action all leads to the Kennedy Center where one of the foreign men is going to assassinate the President of the United States just as Lady Gaga belts out "Whatever Will Be" during a medley of Jo's greatest hits.
Hey, you never know. But seriously, if you guys want to use this....ring my agent.
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