Not Planes, Not Automobiles but Trains

[Psycho]

Originally Posted by SIMON ADEBISI

Under Siege 2

I was scrolling down hoping no one had said that yet!

Psycho

[Guest 45586]

I think David Lean had a soft spot for trains - Brief Encounter of course, previously cited by Mr Hodson, but also Lawrence of Arabia and, especially, Doctor Zhivago. Not my favorite movie but I love the build-up to the Intermission with that fabulously Bolshevik puff-puff - with Tom Courtenay looking murderous in the cab - scorching across the frozen wastes: "Yes . . . that's Strelnikov!"

[Raigmore]

Originally Posted by Psycho

I was scrolling down hoping no one had said that yet!

Psycho

There is no train sequence in Psycho.

[Guest 25476]

I love Howard Hawk's Twentieth Century a superb, screwball comedy and the masterful train sequence in The American Friend puts the equivalent in the tepid remake to shame

[John Hodson]

Originally Posted by Person A

...and the masterful train sequence in The American Friend puts the equivalent in the tepid remake to shame

Sorry for going OT, but I was surprised that I quite enjoyed the remake. That's more to do with the fact that even before I saw the film, I 'saw' Tom Ripley as John Malkovich; Highsmith would have loved him, and it's a delicious bit of casting.

[Guest 2637]

Originally Posted by Gossage

Another one to add to the list is North West Frontier a.k.a. Flame Over India (1959).

I wish Network had released, or will in future re-release this DVD in anamorphic widscreen.

This is available in France,released by PVB Editions.Remastered anamorphic widescreen.French subtitles cannot be removed unless you have an older Toshiba player.I have finally ordered it today from Alapage.com .Happy days.First-time orders from there get a 5 Euro reduction,making the total for this dvd delivered about Ł11.50.

PS:It is 'Aux Frontieres Des Indes'.

[R-T-C]

I was considering writing up a list of all the train films a while back, but you got here first! I figured that in order to make a useful reference list, we need to sort the films into catagories based on the amount of train:

1) Entire film set on or around trains

2) About half the film set on or around trains

3) One or two key scenes set on trains

(of course there are loads of films with brief scenes on trains and even more with stock shots of them, but then there would be too many to list!).

---

Therefore from the existing lists, the films I know would fit thus:

Entire Film set on or around trains

The Titfield Thunderbolt
Horror Express
Emperor of the North

About half the film set on or around trains

The Railway Children
The First Great Train Robbery

One or two key scenes set on trains

Some Like it Hot
Night Train to Munich

--

I've not seen many of them, and others not too recently so please take this list and add more of the titles if you know the details.
You could also sort by the type of train (steam/diesel), the film genre or the era, but I'll leave that to someone who knows more of these films than I do.

[jroadley]

I've just ordered Night Train To Paris, its the only one I can think of thats not already been posted

[douglasb]

Doesn't one of the St Trinian's films have a chuffin' great climax?

[Raigmore]

Originally Posted by douglasb

Doesn't one of the St Trinian's films have a chuffin' great climax?

I think there is a movie called "The Great St Trinian's Robbery" or something like it. But I don't know if it has train sequences.

But another Ealing movie that does have a substantial one is "Two Way Stretch"

[Guest 29]

Originally Posted by douglasb

Doesn't one of the St Trinian's films have a chuffin' great climax?

Yes, "The Great St Trinian's Train Robbery" starring the great Frankie Howerd.

[Guest 4576]

Terror Train - a daft but enjoyable slasher with Jamie Lee Curtis featuring a killer with an amazingly well stocked dressing-up box.

[John Hodson]

Originally Posted by Wendell Armbruster

I think David Lean had a soft spot for trains - Brief Encounter of course, previously cited by Mr Hodson, but also Lawrence of Arabia and, especially, Doctor Zhivago. Not my favorite movie but I love the build-up to the Intermission with that fabulously Bolshevik puff-puff - with Tom Courtenay looking murderous in the cab - scorching across the frozen wastes: "Yes . . . that's Strelnikov!"

Hmmm; and also A Passage to India &, more famously, 'Kwai' where the train makes a brief but spectacular appearance; BTW, there's a new DVD of Horror Express coming to R2 October from Cinema Club.

[Guest 17866]

Death Line (aka Raw Meat)
Also a very terrible badly made Jean Claude Van Damme straight to the 97 pence bargain bin at Tesco effort called Derailed

There are also train sequences in:
From Russia With Love
Live and Let Die
A View to a Kill would be pushing it a bit but the bad guy does get to drive the mining locomotive!
Indianna Jones and the Temple of Doom (sort of!)

[Guest 1472]

Jean Renoir's La Bęte Humaine and Fritz Lang's remake Human Desire

[Guest 29]

There is a fine train in "Heaven's Gate" too.

[Guest 17866]

I forgot The Cassandra Crossing!!

Wins awards for the most railway continuity errors does that one!

[DanWilde1966]

A strange choice, but the best scenes in The Magic Christian take place on trains.

Another favourite: Bunuel's That Obscure Object of Desire. And Dr Terror's House of Horrors. And the classic, iconic opening of Get Carter...

[Raigmore]

Originally Posted by John Hodson

[I]
The Ghost Train

Has anyone actually seen this 1941 British B-movie? I was on the lookout for it for a long time and finally found it on e-bay this morning.

[DanWilde1966]

High Noon. The film doesn't take place on a train, but the action is focused obsessively around the impending arrival of one. Similarly, Bad Day at Black Rock begins with a train arriving and concludes with one leaving.

The French Connection is built around the iconic ten-minute editing masterclass of a car chasing an El-train. Not exactly the "romance" of trains - rather, the gritty reality of the subway. Hill's The Warriors and Badham's Saturday Night Fever use the NY subway in a similar way.