The Train (1964) on Netflix
In August 1944, Colonel Franz von Waldheim loads looted art from the Jeu de Paume onto a train for Germany. Resistance railway inspector Paul Labiche is asked to stop the shipment.
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- Rotten Tomatoes94%
Trailer
Plot summary
The Allies are closing on Paris in August 1944, and the German occupiers are shipping home the art they have looted. Colonel Franz von Waldheim, who has gathered paintings from French museums and private collections in the Jeu de Paume, arranges a train to carry the collection to Germany. The gallery's curator, Mlle Villard, turns to the French Resistance for help. Many of its members work for the national railway, and because the liberation is near, they only have to hold the train back for a few days. Paul Labiche, a railway inspector and a Resistance cell leader, refuses at first; he will not risk the lives of his workers for paintings. German soldiers escort the crates, and the art must survive the operation intact.
Cast
Did you know?!Facts and trivia about The Train (1964)
Can contain spoilers, watch the movie first.
- Frankenheimer inherited the film from Arthur Penn, whom Lancaster fired after three days of filming in France. Penn wanted an intimate film musing on why Lancaster's character would risk his life to save the country's great art from the Nazis, while Lancaster wanted action to ensure a hit after the failure of his film The Leopard.
- With the production shut down while the script was rewritten and the budget doubled, Frankenheimer used the production's desperation in negotiations: his name was made part of the title, “John Frankenheimer's The Train”; the French co-director demanded by French tax laws was never allowed to set foot on set; he was given total final cut; and a Ferrari.
- An ancient “Bourbonnais” type 0-6-0 locomotive, apparently decommissioned by SNCF, was deliberately wrecked to block the line; it moved faster than the film crew anticipated and smashed three of the five cameras placed near to the track in the process.
- The Allied bombing of a rail yard was accomplished with real dynamite, as the French rail authority needed to enlarge the track gauge, and the shockwaves can be observed traveling through the ground during the action sequence.
- The train's interception was inspired by the seizure of train No. 40,044 outside Paris in August 1944 by Lt. Alexandre Rosenberg of the Free French forces. On his soldiers' opening the wagon doors, he viewed many plundered pieces of art that had once been displayed in the home of his father, the Parisian art dealer Paul Rosenberg.
