Runaway Train

Based around a screenplay written by the legendary Akira Kurosawa, Runaway Train simultaneously follows three threads. The escape of two prisoners, Manny & Buck, who jump on a train only to find that the driver has a heart attack, thus it speeds out of control. Then there is the efforts of the train dispatching office to try and safely stop the out-of-control train. And also there's the hunt by the sadistic prison warden who is hellbent on recapturing the fleeing convicts.

Relentless and engrossing action film from start to finish, Runaway Train boasts two Oscar nominated performances from John Voight {Manny} and Eric Roberts {Buck} and no little intelligence with its well scripted characters. The opening quarter is pretty stock routine prison fare, these guys are tough, the warden is a bastard and we just know they are going to escape. But once the guys board the train the whole film shifts in gear and tone. The dynamic that exists between Manny & Buck, partners but very different in life approach, is riveting stuff courtesy of the nifty dialogue exchanges. Things are further enhanced by the appearance of Rebecca DeMornay's also stranded railway worker, Sara, who far from being a shoe-horned token female character, is the crucial piece of the emotional jigsaw. He presence gives the guys room to exorcise their demons and pour out their feelings of anger, bravado and mistrust.

The action scenes are very well handled by director Andrei Konchalovsky and his crew. As the train hurtles thru the snowy Alaskan wilderness we are treated to a number of crash bang wallops involving the train itself; derring-do from our boys on the icy outside of the locomotive, and a helicopter pursuit chartered by the obsessed John P. Ryan as Warden Ranken particularly stand out. Bona fide action sequences that are executed skilfully. Then we get to the finale, a finale pumped up for emotional impact, both visually and orally it closes the film justly. We even get time for a bit of Will Shakespeare as we go about reflecting on what we have just witnessed. A fine movie it be. 7.5/10

'Runaway Train' is a rare thing, an intelligent action movie, full of both exciting sequences and strong character development. This combination makes it all that much more suspenseful and powerful. For me it could well be the best action movie of all time. Interestingly enough it's based on a screenplay by Kurosawa, but criminal turned novelist Edward Bunker (who plays Jonah here but is best known to most people as Mr. Blue in 'Reservoir Dogs') gets the main writing credit. Jon Voight gives one of his very best performances as Manny, but Eric Roberts is also just great. Roberts is overlooked these days, making too many b-grade and straight-to-video movies to be taken seriously, but boy, back in the day this guy was GOOD! Check him out here, and in 'Star 80', and especially 'The Pope Of Greenwich Village' with Mickey Rourke. Roberts actually scored an Oscar nomination for 'Runaway Train'. Just why his career subsequently went in the direction it did is one of the great mysteries of Hollywood. Voight and Roberts are supported by Rebecca De Mornay, super tough guy John P. Ryan ('It's Alive') and well loved character actor Kenneth McMillan. Also keep an eye out for Danny Trejo in the boxing sequence towards the very beginning of the film. 'Runaway Train' is a movie I never tire of watching. The interplay between Voight and Roberts is wonderful to watch, the action sequences are breathtaking, and the ending is one of the all time greats!

RUNAWAY TRAIN is one of only a few films which are so great that you'll like the people involved in it for the rest of their career regardless in which movies they appear in the future. Walter Hill's underrated STREETS OF FIRE did this to Willem Dafoe, Diane Lane and even Michael Pare while RUNAWAY TRAIN did the same to John Voight, Rebecca DeMornay and even Eric Roberts.

I find it interesting that a film written by a Japanese (Akira Kurosawa!) and directed by a Russian (Andrej Konchalowsky) which features American actors can be such a coherent masterpiece. Although the story is very simple there are deeper layers of meaning which have a lot to say about the human condition and which are so universal that everyone can read the metaphors. Truly an existential action-film!

RUNAWAY TRAIN is not only one of my favorite action-movies of all times but one of the greatest films ever in my opinion. And the famous "gold"-monologue by Manny is just so true!

The stock title promises action and suspense, and we get that, but with a story by Akira Kurosawa, expert direction by Russian émigré Andrei Konchalovsky and superior lensing by Alan Hume, we get a study of what defines a man.

John Voight and the vastly underrated Eric Roberts play two cons who escape from a hellish gulag and board a train with no driver. Their struggle to stop the train and battle their own inner demons is the movie.

Konchalovsky creates a cold, alien, ethereal world inside the train that, in the oddest way, provides a haven for self-examination for the two leads. Rebecca de Mournay is layered into the mix, as is the indefatigable John P. Ryan as a prison warden who risks death to return his charges to custody, but the movie belongs to Voight and Roberts who both bring tremendous humanity to their finely sketched characters.

The final image is as powerful as cinema gets and marks RUNAWAY TRAIN as a modest masterpiece.

Though often criticized for producing cheap rubbish, the Cannon Group, in fact, also produced many fine films including this, 52 PICK-UP and MARIA'S LOVERS (also Konchalovsky).

I don't think I could dislike the movie that gave us both Machete and Zeus.

In all seriousness though, Runaway Train might just be the best film to come out from the crap-factory known as Cannon Group. Unsurprisingly this gem is based on a script by someone head and shoulders above the pack, this being here Akira Kurosawa. But no man is an island, and it takes considerably more than a script to make a movie. Jon Voight and Eric Roberts might provide the best performances I've seen from either one in a chilling setting that beautifully emphasizes the desperation of the characters in both their current predicament and life in general.

In addition to compelling cinematography, this Cannon film also surprises the viewer with yet another aspect sorely missing in many of their films: character development. This films grips the viewer on so many fronts and doesn't let go. The Runaway Train might be without a driver, but the film about it very much in control of its own fate, from beginning to end. I was pleasantly surprised by the way the movie almost poetically wraps itself done before the credits roll like any properly told story should.

It saddens me to realize how often overlooked this movie is. Before the Cannon Group documentary Electric Boogaloo I don't remember any mention of it, even though I've scanned quite some of their catalogue in search of "so bad it's good" b-movies (and boy, do they deliver that in a steaming pile!)

However, Runaway Train is in a completely different category, and despite some minor flaws I do heartily recommend it to anyone even vaguely interested in it. Such poetry in film never comes too often to our screens, so it should be savoured at every chance.