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Berlin Express

  • 1948
  • Approved
  • 1h 27m
IMDb RATING
6.8/10
3.8K
YOUR RATING
Robert Ryan in Berlin Express (1948)
A multinational group of train passengers become involved in a post-World War II Nazi assassination plot.
Play trailer1:34
2 Videos
14 Photos
Film NoirCrimeDramaThriller

A multinational group of train passengers become involved in a post-World War II Nazi assassination plot.A multinational group of train passengers become involved in a post-World War II Nazi assassination plot.A multinational group of train passengers become involved in a post-World War II Nazi assassination plot.

  • Director
    • Jacques Tourneur
  • Writers
    • Harold Medford
    • Curt Siodmak
  • Stars
    • Merle Oberon
    • Robert Ryan
    • Charles Korvin
  • See production info at IMDbPro
  • IMDb RATING
    6.8/10
    3.8K
    YOUR RATING
    • Director
      • Jacques Tourneur
    • Writers
      • Harold Medford
      • Curt Siodmak
    • Stars
      • Merle Oberon
      • Robert Ryan
      • Charles Korvin
    • 65User reviews
    • 41Critic reviews
  • See production info at IMDbPro
    • Awards
      • 1 nomination total

    Videos2

    Official Trailer
    Trailer 1:34
    Official Trailer
    Berlin Express Clip
    Clip 0:30
    Berlin Express Clip
    Berlin Express Clip
    Clip 0:30
    Berlin Express Clip

    Photos13

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    Top cast66

    Edit
    Merle Oberon
    Merle Oberon
    • Lucienne
    Robert Ryan
    Robert Ryan
    • Robert Lindley
    Charles Korvin
    Charles Korvin
    • Perrot
    Paul Lukas
    Paul Lukas
    • Dr. Bernhardt
    Robert Coote
    Robert Coote
    • Sterling
    Reinhold Schünzel
    Reinhold Schünzel
    • Walther
    • (as Reinhold Schunzel)
    Roman Toporow
    • Lt. Maxim
    Peter von Zerneck
    • Hans Schmidt
    Otto Waldis
    Otto Waldis
    • Kessler
    Fritz Kortner
    Fritz Kortner
    • Franzen
    Michael Harvey
    Michael Harvey
    • Sgt. Barnes
    Tom Keene
    Tom Keene
    • Major
    • (as Richard Powers)
    Taylor Allen
    • Fräulein
    • (uncredited)
    Will Allister
    • Richard
    • (uncredited)
    Frank Alten
    • German Steward
    • (uncredited)
    Arthur Berkeley
    • Nightclub Patron
    • (uncredited)
    Robert Boon
    • German Youth #2
    • (uncredited)
    Ernst Brengt
    • Artist
    • (uncredited)
    • Director
      • Jacques Tourneur
    • Writers
      • Harold Medford
      • Curt Siodmak
    • All cast & crew
    • Production, box office & more at IMDbPro

    User reviews65

    6.83.8K
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    Featured reviews

    7cherold

    interesting view of post-war Germany

    This movie is most notable as a historical document giving a glimpse of Germany after the war. The location shots in bombed out Frankfurt and Berlin are rather startling, and it's interesting to see the hatred and mistrust everyone has for the Germans. The movie is shot very well and the early scenes are excellent.

    Unfortunately the script is weak. Towards the end I realized that I just wasn't clear on why things were happening as they were. It felt like the plot was just a backdrop to the ambiance, which was fine in the beginning but became a problem as the plot moved its wobbly self to center stage. I can't entirely blame the script though; I think Tourneur's greatest failing as a director is that while he had a lot of style and could always make things interesting, he could be sloppy in terms of telling a story. Of course he wasn't the only director who believed you could gloss over a lot if you just kept things moving, but that works better with a good muddled script like The Big Sleep rather than the distinctly ordinary but muddled script he worked with here. Still worth seeing though.
    8LCShackley

    On the right track

    Earlier today I posted a negative review of SPY TRAIN, a WWII-era thriller flop about Nazi spies on a train, all done by the numbers, and not very well.

    Thank heaven for BERLIN EXPRESS, which is a potent antidote to formulaic war thrillers. Here the "McGuffin" is the need to deliver Dr. Bernhardt safely to a conference in Berlin, where he has a wonderful plan for reuniting Germany. But of course, there are sinister forces at work to prevent him from arriving.

    Bernhardt's secretary, Lucienne (Oberon) is on a train with her boss and several good-looking male passengers who represent the four Allied powers. An intercepted message has warned of danger, but no one knows what to expect. Danger does indeed strike, and when the train arrives in Frankfurt, things become decidedly worse. There's a kidnapping, a hanging, a gun-toting clown, and plenty of awe-inspiring shots of bombed-out Frankfurt (much like the Vienna of THIRD MAN). Bits of humor lighten up a taut, well-written script.

    What makes this film better than dreck like SPY TRAIN is its sense of reality, which is cemented by good characters and embellished by the very real locations. Shot in Paris, Frankfurt, and a shelled Berlin, it plays like something from post-war headlines. (The running narration, which is not obtrusive, lends the sense of a documentary.) The only sour note is a saccharine ending, in which the characters from each country exit the screen to the sounds of national theme songs. But that's not enough to spoil a very engaging thriller. It's great for war movie fans, and for students of history who want a look at the aftermath of WWII.
    dougdoepke

    Revealing and Engrossing

    Most everyone has seen film of the atomic leveling of Hiroshima and Nagasaki during WWII. However, this revealing flick shows the lesser seen ravages of conventional bombing of WWII Germany, specifically Frankfurt and Berlin. Only jaggedly grim foundations are left standing, except for the lavish Siemens corporate complex which remains perfectly intact. I expect there's an interesting backstory to that. Anyway, I gather this was the first movie to show Germany's urban destruction, which, all things considered, stands as the movie's centerpiece.

    Nonetheless, the screenplay weaves an interesting post-war thread into the compelling visuals. Seems the influential Dr. Bernhardt is trying to bring the four occupying powers (U.S., Britain, France, and Soviet Union) into a unifying compact that will prevent their breakup into rivals and also make a resurgence of German militarism more difficult. (However, the nature of the German resistance, whether Neo-Nazi or otherwise, is never specified.) The trouble is elements of that German resistance are trying to eliminate the Doctor and his plans for allied unity. It seems that keeping those occupying powers separate will make a German resurgence easier. Thus protecting Dr. Bernhardt becomes an allied priority. The movie's suspense then becomes figuring out which of the cast members are actually German resistance operatives.

    If there is such a thing as noir intrigue, RKO has fashioned it. Most of the activity takes place in the shadows of railway cars and dour rooms along with twilight chases through the urban rubble. But then this is expert noir director Tourneur along with art and set direction from the talented D'Agostino and Silvera. As a result, the plot and visuals complement one another compellingly. Then too, as a revealing period fact, we find out how important cigarettes were when no common money exists.

    This 1947 production reflects a post-war period prior to the onset of the uncompromising Cold War between the Soviets and the U.S. Thus the film's Soviet officer is treated in sympathetic fashion totally unlike the many movie and TV caricatures that would follow. For a Cold War product like myself, that takes some real getting used to. Too bad the movie's hopeful note of European, American, and a Soviet compact was not borne out in practice.

    Anyway, it's an unusual and provocative film, certainly deserving of more recognition and less obscurity than what it's gotten. So don't pass it up.
    6alice liddell

    Textbook example of brilliant direction complicating simplistic script.

    On a surface level this is a kind of benevolent THIRD MAN, as a group of international comrades, most prominently a naive American, try to root out sinister Germans and a betraying friend in the rubbles of post-war Europe. The script is a model of civic decency, as it dramatises the lingering dangers facing Europe after the war, but offering a narrative of co-operation and hope.

    Director Tourneur, however, had only just directed the beautifully bleak OUT OF THE PAST, and this film is full of a blackness overwhelming good intentions, where the frightening contingencies of history and inexplicable darkness of man are not so easily swept aside. His mastery of space and lighting, his disturbing compositions and vigorous editing are an eternal pleasure not to be enjoyed again until Scorcese's glory days.
    7imauter

    A good thriller

    Set in a post WW-2 Germany, "Berlin Express" is a quite interesting thriller directed by Jacques Tourneur. The story is basically about a group of people each of whom representing Russian, French, American and British forces who are united in trying to solve an assassination attempt made by Nazi underground group on a Professor Bernhardt, one of the former liders of German Resistance to Nazis and now a chairman of a commission for post-war unification of Germany.

    "Berlin Express" is particularly interesting for it's exteriors shot in 1947 on real locations with special permission from Allied forces, showing destroyed by bombings Frankfurt and Berlin. 7/10

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    Related interests

    Lauren Bacall and Humphrey Bogart in Le grand sommeil (1946)
    Film Noir
    James Gandolfini, Edie Falco, Sharon Angela, Max Casella, Dan Grimaldi, Joe Perrino, Donna Pescow, Jamie-Lynn Sigler, Tony Sirico, and Michael Drayer in Les Soprano (1999)
    Crime
    Mahershala Ali and Alex R. Hibbert in Moonlight (2016)
    Drama
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    Thriller

    Storyline

    Edit

    Did you know

    Edit
    • Trivia
      At the end of their bus ride through bombed-out Frankfurt, the main characters arrive at the massive I.G. Farben building. Completed in 1930, it was once the largest office building in Europe and home to the giant chemical business. From 1945 to 1952 it was the location of SHAEF (Supreme Headquarters, Allied European Forces). From 1952 to 1994 it was the headquarters of the U.S. Army's V Corps. In 1996 the building was acquired by the state of Hessen, and after a $25M renovation became the Westend Campus of the University of Frankfurt. The small, continuous elevators seen in the film, called paternoster lifts, are still in use.
    • Goofs
      When Dr. Bernhardt is being shown smoking a cigarette in the reflection of a passing train, the image is the opposite of how it should appear in a reflection.
    • Quotes

      Narrator: [voiceover] That's right - the dove of peace was a pigeon. A dead pigeon.

    • Crazy credits
      During the opening credits, a title card states that the photography of Berlin and Frankfurt is used with the cooperation of the occupying armies.
    • Connections
      Featured in Pulp Cinema (2001)

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    FAQ15

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    Details

    Edit
    • Release date
      • June 21, 1949 (France)
    • Country of origin
      • United States
    • Languages
      • English
      • German
      • French
      • Russian
    • Also known as
      • Berlin-Express
    • Filming locations
      • Administration building IG-Farben, Frankfurt am Main, Hessen, Germany
    • Production company
      • RKO Radio Pictures
    • See more company credits at IMDbPro

    Tech specs

    Edit
    • Runtime
      • 1h 27m(87 min)
    • Color
      • Black and White
    • Aspect ratio
      • 1.37 : 1

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