Best Movie With A Train In It

[AztecEagle]

[?]Okay Folks.What Is Your Favorite Movie With A Train In It?My Faves#1:"Larry McMurtry's'Streets of Laredo'".Sequel to "Lonesome Dove".James Garner;Sissy Spacek;Wes Studi;Plus The Texas State Railroad Running in The Desert Around Alpine and Marfa in West Texas Instead of The East Texas Piney Woods.#2:"The Professionals".Great Scenes Throughout The Film Of Steam Freights in The Nevada Desert.#3:"Bad Day At Black Rock".Spencer Tracy Gets Off A Train In The Middle of The Desert And Brings Justice In A Corrupt Small Town.Great Scenes of An Espee 'Black Widow'F7ABA Lashup Plus Passenger Cars in the Beautiful "Daylight"Scheme.#4:"Firewalker".SoSo PotBoiler From '86 With Chuck Norris and Lou Gossett As A Couple of Soldiers Of Fortune Looking For Lost Treasure.Great Scenes Of The National Railways of Mexico.#5:"Silver Streak".Gene Wilder;Richard Pryor and Jill Clayburgh Take A Wild Ride On The Canadian Pacific.#6:"The Long Riders".Story of The James-Younger Gang With Four Sets of Real Life Brothers Potraying The James-Younger Gang.Great Shots of The Texas State Railroad and The Sierra Railroad."Strangers on a Train".Hitchcock's Tale of Suspense and Murder On A Train.Some Stock Footage of PRR and NH Equiopment.#8:"The Great Escape".POW Escape Epic From 1963.Great Scenes of WW2 Vintage German Railways Equipment,Plus James Garner and Donald Pleasance Jump Off A Moving Train.David McCollum Dies in A Shootout With The *** In A Passenger Station Platform.#9:"The Rough Riders".Made For TV Epic About The Spanish American War.Great Scenes of The Texas State Railroad.#9:"O Brother Where Art Thou?".Sidesplitter About Three Escaped Convicts On The Lam In 1938 Mississippi With George Clooney;Tim Blake Nelson and John Tuttoro.Great Scenes At The Beginning of George Clooney Trying To Hop A Freight.[:D]Okay.What Are Your Faves?[?][8)]

[artpeterson]

Agree that "Bad Day at Black Rock" has some great SP footage in it. "North by Northwest" has those great NYC shots (plus some vintage CTA buses in the background scenes). "Call Northside 777" has some great Chicago streetcar footage in it, too, but I guess transit's off-topic!

[Anonymous]

I like the movie atomic train it's pretty cool.

[chad thomas]

One of my all time favorite movies is Tough Guys with Kirk Douglas and Bert Lancaster. Great scenes with the SP 4449 in Taylor yard and out on Kiser's Eagle Mt mine RR.

[CSXrules4eva]

flymank welcome to the forums, and yes I though atomic train was pretty cool.

I'm going to have to say my favorite moive with a train in it is Money Train even though it only has subway units of the MTA, in New York. I like the movie plot, and the story line. Right now I can't think of any other moive that's my favorite with a train in it becides CSX Mountain Sub and a couple of other railfan videos.

[Anonymous]

Alien Express!!! Love that model train footage. LOL [:D][:p][:)][}:)]

Seriously, though, I have wishlists on my TiVo for locomotive*, railroad*, and train so I can try to pick up on the old classics. Unfortunately my memory is a little weak and I don't keep notes so it's hard to come up with some of the titles.

I did like Scalplock, the old made for TV movie with Dale Robertson as a gambler who wins a railroad and then has to figure out how to finish building it. It gives me inspiration for working on my own pike.

Bill

[UPTRAIN]

Anything with "Pentrex" on it, lol.

[Anonymous]

"The Taking of Pelham 123." It may be a subway train, but the story's good.

"Superman" ( with Christopher Reeve) Love those scenes of the New Haven FL9, not to mention the scene where Clark Kent is running alongside the passenger train.

It's not a movie, but I've always liked the quick glimpses of the passenger trains at the begining of the old Superman t.v. show. You get a look at either a steam powered Daylight train, or a diesel powered Rock Island passenger train.

[railfan619]

MY favorite train movies are
1. Money train
2.Atomic train
3.Runaway
now those are some really good train watching movies

[Anonymous]

Best movie with a train in it: Either "Lawrence of Arabia" or "Dr. Zhivago".

Most gripping movie with lots of train action: "The Train".

[BNSF_GP60M]

Does movies with "Machines of Iron" on it count?

[Anonymous]

Toss up for me- "The Train" is cool- just watching Burt Lancaster whale away on a locomotive side rod, pick the thing up (by hand) and slap it on to the side of a steam locomotive... well, it makes my wife's knees weak.

I like "Tough Guys" too- wasn't that Doyle McCormack running the Daylight?

Saw an interesting movie the other day on AMC- something called "Sullivan's Travels"- lots of shots of what appeared to be SP steam running over hobos. Now THAT'S entertainment!

Erik

[PBenham]

The opening sequence of the otherwise awful[xx(] "Valley of the Dolls" had an NYC RS3 on a passenger run on the Harlem division, heading south toward N.White Plains. I DEFINATELY DO NOT RECOMMEND THE REST OF THAT DOG! I was appeasing my girlfriend (at the time) when I last watched that chunk of [censored][*^_^*]! I did see one of David P. Morgan's faves: "Grand Canyon(?) Holiday" at a film festival and the AT&SF footage with F3s, PAs and 2900s made the rest of that turkey go down a little easier! Many films with trains in them leave a LOT to be desired! A good one is unlikely, RATS![:(]

[bondjamesbond]

"The Train" with Burt Lancaster

[Anonymous]

Risky Business. The 'L' scene.

[Anonymous]

Some great movies listed so far. I agree with the folks who listed The Train as being one of the best films. I love the arial footage as well as the bombing and crash sequences. Sound effects are great, specificly the whistle in the tunnel! But one of the greatest train films has to be Emperor of the North. The conductor/hobo relationship is vicious. I felt that I would rather be goofing off with with the hobos that working for the railroad. A fun bunch of people! The details of the Oregon Railroad are to be viewed and savored. If you model, many great ideas can be had.

[siberianmo]

[2c] On the subject goes hands down to:

Narrow Margin a 1990 movie starring Gene Hackman. The story line isn't bad, a thriller that has all kinds of great VIA Rail shots, inside and outside of the "Canadian" en route Vancouver in the Canadian Rockies.

This flick is in my VHS and DVD libraries.

[Anonymous]

Anybody remember Hitchcock's "The Lady Vanishes?" He made it while he was still in the U.K. B&W from around 1939 I think. I think it's still available on VHS or DVD.

[blhanel]

What was the name of the classic John Wayne train robbery film? I want to get that DVD for my meager collection.

[Anonymous]

1 - Danger Lights
2- Emperor of the North Pole

Old Timer

[Anonymous]

From Russia with love has a train in it! I would have to go with the Hurricane Express being a John Wayne fan.

[blhanel]

QUOTE: Originally posted by Lotus098

I would have to go with the Hurricane Express being a John Wayne fan.

Hmmm... imdb.com says it's "More yak than track". I can't figure out which one he did where they pulled off an elaborate scheme to rob a mail car; it could be "The Train Robbers", but based on the descriptions, I'm not sure.

[Anonymous]

charlie bronson saved the day in "breakheart pass" which co-starred the train as much as anybody. the trainwreck in slow motion with the old wooden cars was really cool; they just kept busting up into smaller pieces.

[Anonymous]

Burt Lancaster in "The Train" No1;
Dr Zhivago; and Lawrence of Arabia hard to improve on too.
What about an Eastern European film in Russia, "Yerenski's Kindergarden" must have been made in 1980's I suspect, it has great scenes aboard Soviet military trains of flat cars and Red Army tanks hauled by Baldwin, Alco or Lima 2-10-0's of Yea type. They were still in use in far east / siberia 1970's mid 80's. A few later were seen in North Korea. Can any one tell more of the movie?

[Anonymous]

This topic has come up before, but it's still a good one.

QUOTE: Originally posted by lincoln5390

Anybody remember Hitchcock's "The Lady Vanishes?" He made it while he was still in the U.K. B&W from around 1939 I think. I think it's still available on VHS or DVD.

I love that movie! If I had to pick my top five favourite movies of all time, The Lady Vanishes would unquestionably be one of them! It was the success of this film that lead to Hitchcock being noticed by Hollywood and coming to the United States.

If you like The Lady Vanishes, then I would recommend that you also check out the films Seven Sinners (1936), Night Train To Munich (1940) and Sleeping Car To Trieste (1948). Like The Lady Vanishes, all three are Briti***hrillers involing spies, international intrigue and trains that do great jobs of blending edge-of-your-seat suspense with laugh-out-loud comedy. Seven Sinners was written by Frank Launder and Sidney Gilliat, the same people who wrote the script for The Lady Vanishes and features footage real-life of a train wreck. Night Train To Munich (directed by Carol Reed) was also written by Launder and Gilliat and features some of the cast of The Lady Vanishes, with Margatet Lockwood as the heroine and Basil Radford and Naunton Wayne reprising their previous roles of cricket-obsessed Charters and Caldicott. The male leads are Rex Harisson and Paul Henried. Sleeping Car To Trieste takes place on the Orient Express and was a remake of a 1933 film called Rome Express (which might be good also, but I haven't seen it yet).

As far as other movies with trains in them, Silver Streak, Strangers on Train, Narrow Margin, The Train, Lawrence of Arabia, Dr. Zhivago and Tough Guys all come to mind, but they have all been mentioned, so I won't elaborate on them any further.

On the subject of Hitchcock, who can forget North By Northwest (1959) and Shadow of a Doubt (1943) featuring the 20th Century Limited and an SP local? Hitchcock himself was something of a train buff. Almost half of his movies feature a train scene of some kind (even if very brief) or else train sound effects in the background.

In Planes, Trains and Automobiles (1987), John Candy and Steve Martin take a ride on a "Contrack" train (in a sharp blue and orange paint scheme) pulled by a C420 that more than lives up to the reputation Alcos have of producing lots of smoke.

For those that like 4-4-0's, there are Buster Keaton's The General (1927) and Disney's The Great Locomotive Chase (1956), both telling the story of the same event from very different perspectives. Both feature plenty of great train chase scenes.

Von Ryan's Express (1964) has Frank Sinatra leading a group of POW's as they escape on a stolen train in Italy.

Then there's Cecil B. DeMille's Union Pacific (1939) with Barbara Stanwyck and Joel McCrea which centres around the building of the UP across the continent in 1869. The last spike ceremony at Promentory, Utah is even recreated in the film. Lucius Beebe was a technical advisor for this movie.

All of the above of great movies in my opinion. As for bad movies with trains, Atomic Train instantly comes to mind (no offense to those who say they enjoyed it, though, to each his own).

Another bad train movie is Under Seige 2: Dark Territory with Steven Seagal battling terrorists in control of a satellite that could destroy the world on a cross-country luxury train. To the film's credit, the train itself is actually very attractive with a nice paint scheme.

[MJ4562]

1) Emperor of the North. Trains running in the scenic Northwest with a couple of actors thrown in.

2) The General (Buster Keaton). Great shots of old time 4-4-0s.

3) The Train. Don't remember much but it was good.

[Anonymous]

I OVE THE MOVIE VON RYANS EXPRESS.

[videomaker]

Hey guy's,
Anybody seen the new Zorro flic? It's got a lot of train scenes in it..Ive only seen the trailer at the last movie I went to but I was thinking of seeing it..Any comments would be helpful,good or bad..

[vsmith]

My fav's

Buster Keaton -The General

Buster Keaton- Our Hospitality

Burt Lancaster-the Train

Emporer of the North

Silver Streak-

Union Pacific -

The Titfield Thunderbolt-



Movies to Avoid like 3 day old sushi:
Atomic Train-[xx(][xx(][xx(]
Under Sludge-Dark Territory-[xx(][xx(][xx(]

and the WORST train movie of all time....
The Cassandra Crossing-[xx(][xx(][xx(][xx(]

[AztecEagle]

Okay.Another One I Thought Of:"The Fugitive"With Harrison Ford and Tommy Lee Jones.Great Last Second Escape Scene Before The Train Hits It!!Also:"In The Heat of The Night".Great Scenes of Sidney Poitier Arriving and Departing On A GM&O Passenger Train,Plus One Scene With A Couple of MoPac Freights and Sidney Poitier Defending Himself Against A Gang Of Bullies In A Locomotive Shop.Also,The TV Series With Carroll O'Connor and Howard Rollins Opened With An Amtrak Train Coming Through Town In The Middle of The Night,Plus Occasionally Showed Some CSX Freights Going Through Town As Well."Coal Miner's Daughter".Sissy Spacek as Loretta Lynn.Scenes of Former CP"Royal Hudson"Pulling A Train Through Town."Giant".Epic Saga of A West Texas Ranching Family.Beginning Shows A C&O Passenger Train Going The Pastoral Virginia/Maryland Countryside.Another Scene Shows Liz Taylor Waking From Her Bedroom In The Riata Ranch Private Car and Seeing That Theyr'e Parked On A Lonely West Texas Siding During The Middle of A Sandstorm.Plus,A Scene Of An Espee Train Bringing The Troops From The War,Plus A Very Poignant Scene Of Some American Legioniares Meeting The Flag Draped Casket of A Fallen Soldier.Availibity:"Giant"and"The Fugitive":Warner Home Video/DVD;"In The Heat Of The Night":MGM/UA Home Video/DVD.