Train movies.....

[Tom Curtin]

Let's not forget The Great Train Robbery.  There may have been, I think, more than one film by this name --- the one I'm thinking of is the 1903 one.  Yes --- 1903, and maybe the first feature film ever.  Although a western, it was shot on the Lackawanna Boonton Line in New Jersey (You can ride it today -- an NJ Transit commuter route!).

RE the disparaging comments about Disney's The Great Locomotive Chase: I always enjoyed that version.  Having read an account or two of the Andrews raid, I would say the Disney film recounted it quite accurately.  Although the real General and Texas still exist neither was used in the film, rather they borrowed engines of the same vintage from the B&O Museum in Baltimore.  The shooting didn't use the real location either --- what had become the Louisville & Nashville (today CSX) main, with its heavy rail and block signals, would hardly have had an 1862-ish look.  The film was shot on the Tallulah Falls RR, an old short line on its last legs at the time, and which was abandoned not many years after its starring role in this film.

 

[spikejones52002]

About thirty years ago I had on the TV while I was getting dressed for work, the afternoon shift. An over the air channel had a 90% on train a lot in Cab movie. It was a French Movie in French with sub-titles. It was shot in a real Cab because of the cramped shots and soot flying. A lot of Cab action.

Never again and no information of.

[fsm1000]

"The General" with Buster Keaton. They used a real locomotive for the crash scene. Took three days to prepare etc for it. Also he is funny as all get out. :D

[topcopdoc]

Silver Streak was a great train movie. For those who like Westerns, Whispering Smith was good also.

Doc 

 

[ssgauge]

Danger Lights

Murder on the Orient Express

Terror by Night

 Von Ryan's Express

The Train

[J. Edgar]

the scene from Rio Lobo is great.......gotta love the Duke

[MilwaukeeRoad]

I always liked Emperor of the North, with Lee Marvin and Ernest Borgnine.

[superheat]

In any event, it would be nice to see more movies made with trains in them. A movie was made recently ('05?), don't remember the name, where Jodie Foster's daughter was kidnapped while on a flight aboard a plane. That same movie could've just as easily been made aboard a passenger train.
It would help return travel by rail back to the American conscience. Most people don't even consider the train when making their travel plans anymore.

[DMUinCT]

I hope you all know, Frank Sinatra was a "big time" rail fan and toy train collector.  A member of The Train Collectors Association, he had a building built on his west coast ranch to house an operation Lionel layout and had a very large collection. A high point, on his visit to the Pope, Sinatra was presented with a brass model train by the Vatican.

Von Ryans Express was a labor of love for him.

[enr2099]

I always liked Emperor of the North, with Lee Marvin and Ernest Borgnine.

 

That was a good movie. Heh, there's a road conductor out of Vancouver(CN) that looks like Ernest Borgnine did in the movie, I found myself watching the movie thinking "hey that looks like so-and-so!"  

[stocksj]

How about Runaway Train with Jon Voigt and Eric Roberts.

[Joe Hohmann]

"Broadway Limited". 95% of the movie is filmed on this train in 1940. I've seen these "movie" threads before...many movies listed show just a few minutes of trains. I'd like to have a list of movies that are BASED on trains.

[D&RGWRR476]

"Runaway Train" is a good movie. You will get the shivers watching it.

"Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid" has some good Silverton train shots.

"Bite the Bullet" has some good Cumbres and Toltec (former DRG) shots.

 

 

 

[CMSTPP]

"Danger Lights" - IF you can find a tape / DVD of the entire movie, not one all chopped up in a 'railfan version' as was done a few years ago. One of the first (maybe the first?) sound movies to be shot entirely 'on location' (Milwaukee Road in Montana).

"Titfield Thunderbolt" - If we can sneak in a little British 'humour'. ;) 

 

I have to agree. I like the Milwaukee and it shows some really nice steam locomotives in that movie. Plus you can see the canternary lines above all the railroad. It's some good footage of the line. Something that has disappeared. I watched the movie just for the railroad really.

Happy railroading

James

[Anonymous]

Turner Classic Movies recently reran Buster Keaton's silent movie "The General".  Very interesting engine pictures, but the story line is awful. Keaton is the engineer, based in the South and I'd swear the history is all screwed up, to use the vernacular.

Great comedy, though.

Art

[twhite]

BREAKHEART PASS

That's a fun film, and really SPECTACULAR train action.  Just wish they'd used models for the wreck sequence instead of smashing that cute little ex-NP caboose all over the mountainside, though (sigh!).  But then I shouldn't carp, I included DENVER AND RIO GRANDE on my list, and it had two actual narrow-gauge trains smashing head-on.  But BREAKHEART PASS is a darned good movie. 

Tom

[IRONHORSE77]

BREAKHEART PASS

[PBenham]

D'OH! I forgot "The General"! It really has a better "feel" to it, I agree. Now, I'll renew my call for a quality re-make, too bad we've missed out on Clint Eastwood* or The Duke doing it right, but there are stars that could get it. And there are stars that should avoid this story like the plague!  (* Clint is still alive-but will not appear in a film unless it is right for him-wish I could say that about working!)

[twhite]

North by Northwest (I know, I know, just a cameo of NYC 25)

As for the "Great Locomotive Chase" the near total lack of originality really hurt it. That movie could have been about a gang of robbers in the old west trying to rob a train (to avenge having been wronged by the railroad) as much as it was about a civil war raid on the Southern rail infrastructure. Fess Parker? Please. If there ever was a drama that cries out for a quality re-make this story is it!

You might want to catch the 1927 silent epic THE GENERAL starring Buster Keaton, which covers the same story as THE GREAT LOCOMOTIVE CHASE but does it with a lot more style and wit and excitement.  It's basically a silent comedy (and one of the best comedies ever made,IMO),but it's also a very thrilling Civil War epic, and the trains are an absolute marvel to watch.  And don't let the fact that it's a 'silent' deter you--the film is just TERRIFIC!  I forgot to put it on my previous posted list--why I don't know. 

Tom

[PBenham]

North by Northwest (I know, I know, just a cameo of NYC 25)

As for the "Great Locomotive Chase" the near total lack of originality really hurt it. That movie could have been about a gang of robbers in the old west trying to rob a train (to avenge having been wronged by the railroad) as much as it was about a civil war raid on the Southern rail infrastructure. Fess Parker? Please. If there ever was a drama that cries out for a quality re-make this story is it!

[twhite]

My favorites:

THE TRAIN

UNION PACIFIC

DENVER AND RIO GRANDE

A TICKET TO TOMAHAWK

VON RYAN'S EXPRESS--especially the latter scenes in the Italian Alps. 

DANGER LIGHTS

SILVER STREAK (not the Gene Wilder film, but the 1930's film featuring the "Pioneer Zephyr" as the star. 

 

Tom

[Texas Chief]

Aw Gee Mojac, that was my favorite part of that movie.

Dick

Texas Chief

[MOJAX]

Course it depends whether we're rating how good the movie is as a movie, or how good the train shots within the movie are, or both. There have been some bad movies that have good train scenes - and some good movies that have goofy train scenes...you know, the people are going from New York to Boston and they run stock footage of UP or the "Super Chief".

In the movie White Christmas, Bing Crosby and crew leave New York on the Santa Fe and head to Vermont! 

[wjstix]

Course it depends whether we're rating how good the movie is as a movie, or how good the train shots within the movie are, or both. There have been some bad movies that have good train scenes - and some good movies that have goofy train scenes...you know, the people are going from New York to Boston and they run stock footage of UP or the "Super Chief".

[train18393]

I am not sure it qualifies as a train movie, but the segment in How The West Was Won has a great segment in it which includes a steam donky on a flatcar as well as a steam train. It was shot with Cinerama cameras so there has to be some great footage in that format that did not make it into the movie

Paul-D&MR

Many Pauls on this board, so I will sign with my fictitious model RR reporting marks.

[alexweiihman]

Von Ryans express and the Classic Australian short film "A steam train passes"

 

Have to agree with von ryans express

[gregrudd]

Von Ryans express and the Classic Australian short film "A steam train passes"

[bobbygreg]

"The Great Locomotive Chase" from Walt Disney, starring Fess Parker, and "The Train" with Burt Lancaster.  Both are excellent, I can watch them over and over.

[wjstix]

"Danger Lights" - IF you can find a tape / DVD of the entire movie, not one all chopped up in a 'railfan version' as was done a few years ago. One of the first (maybe the first?) sound movies to be shot entirely 'on location' (Milwaukee Road in Montana).

"Titfield Thunderbolt" - If we can sneak in a little British 'humour'. ;)