Von Ryan’s Express (1965)
Fox DVD (region 4)
d. Mark Robson; pr. Saul David; scr. Wendell Mayes, Joseph Landon; novel. David Westheimer; ph. William H. Daniels; m. Jerry Goldsmith; ed. Dorothy Spencer; cast. Frank Sinatra, Trevor Howard, Edward Mulhare, Raffaella Carra, Brad Dexter, Sergio Fantoni, John Leyton, Wolfgang Priess, James Brolin, Adolfo Celi (117 mins)
The 1960s was the time of the Roadshow format and of the self-conscious genre movie extravaganza. Whilst the former label carried some prestige, the latter was more populist in appeal, though not necessarily in ambition. Large-budget, lavishly cast wartime adventure movies featured prominently: such films as The Great Escape, The Guns of Navarone and Where Eagles Dare all contributing to the decade’s faith in large-scale widescreen spectacle. Two of these notably lavish wartime adventures centered on trains. The first of these was John Frankenheimer’s The Train, closely followed by Mark Robson’s Von Ryan’s Express. Although Frankenheimer’s film is arguably the better of the two, Von Ryan’s Express remains perhaps the more remembered and is nonetheless a finely crafted, tense and suspenseful wartime adventure clearly inspired in particular by The Great Escape. It also draws upon what remains intriguing about these train films, namely the ambiguous balance they develop between the train as instrument of potential freedom and the sobering reality of their use in World War Two to transport Jews to the death camps. Whilst this analogy in Von Ryan’s Express is not as deliberate as it is in The Train, it infuses the film with a sobering reality. By so referencing this context, the film is part of an attempt to restore the train to the status of a grand icon in the action movie pantheon.
Frank Sinatra stars as Col. Ryan, an American pilot captured by the Italians when his plane is shot down. He is taken to a prisoner of war camp where he urges that they bide their time calmly until the Allies arrive. When Ryan assumes command as superior ranking officer and negates all escape attempts by dubious means, he gets the nickname Von Ryan. His attitude does not sit well with the British prisoners, led by Trevor Howard. Soon, the fortunes of war dictate that Italy reverse its loyalties. When Italy thus finally surrenders to the Allies, the camp is unguarded and the prisoners seek retribution against the commandant who has so tormented them. Sinatra and others intervene in this retribution, actions not increasing their popularity. Soon, the rabble of prisoners, ostensibly looking to Sinatra and Howard for leadership, tries to reach safe ground before the oncoming German troops can takeover the camp. However, they are apprehended and loaded aboard a prisoner transport train. Led now by Sinatra, they take over the train, intending to stop somewhere and disembark, then make their way to freedom on foot. An alternate plan emerges and they come to believe that they can create a ruse by impersonating German officers at the various stops and effectively reroute the train into neutral Switzerland. To do so, they need the help of the only prisoner who can speak German, a chaplain (Edward Mulhare). read more