I have to say, the air raid with explosions all around but nothing falling from the sky to cause them was funny from my perspective sitting 50-odd years in the future from when this was filmed. Say what you will about 1960s movies—many of them are still great, but the effects do tend to show their age.

The other technical comment I have is that Burt Lancaster must have rolled down that hill an awful lot to get all of the camera angles done. Just look at how much footage they have of him tumbling over the grass toward the road!

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Overall, I award this film 8.4/10 — not quite enough to round it up to a 9, but close.

There are some great moments in here, especially as far as the trains are concerned. I applaud the production for making the train "accidents" realistic, rather than having everything explode at the brush of a feather as is so common in more modern Hollywood films. Although the air raid near the beginning does suffer from this a bit—many of those explosions seemed driven by the creation of a spectacle. But no film is perfect, right?

I got some real _Die Hard_ vibes from this, which was unexpected but welcome.

**_Burt Lancaster as a French Resistance fighter trying to stop a German train with stolen art_**

Paris is on the verge of liberation from Nazi occupation in 1944, so a German colonel (Paul Scofield) loads a train with a priceless cargo of French paintings to take to Germany, which Resistance fighters led by engineer Labiche (Burt Lancaster) are intent on stopping. Jeanne Moreau is on hand as a hotel owner.

“The Train” (1964) is a B&W war picture with the unconventional tone of contemporaneous WW2 films “The Young Lions” (1958), “36 Hours” (1964) and “Morituri” (1965). The story starts slow, but becomes increasingly compelling with lots of non-CGI carnage involving tracks and trains. The last act is creative and leaves you with the question: How many lives is art worth? Lovers of steam locomotives should eat this up.

The film runs 2 hours, 12 minutes and was shot in France.

GRADE: B

Great war suspense-thriller from John Frankenheimer. Heard of this one but never got around to checking it out, just excellent from beginning to end, not to mention wonderful use of sound design along with Maurice Jarre's score. Performances all around were great, especially Paul Scofield. Surprising to see it didn't receive more Oscar love outside of the writing. **4.5/5**