Le train de la mort

Now on DVD as Detonator, this was a USA Network Original Movie as Alistair MacLean's Death Train. There is also a sequel Detonator II, or Night Watch. Oddly, even though this was first shown on the USA Network, it is available Widescreen and has a small bit of language.

The cast shines here with Ted Lavine (Captain Stottlemeyer on Monk) as the mercenary who high-jacks a train with a nuclear device on it. Ted Lavine is great in these small crazy roles. The Living Legend, Christopher Lee, (Saruman in the Lord of the Rings movies) in one of his non-horror roles, is the Russian General who hired Levine. Any movie with Christopher Lee is worth watching, and this one shows off his ability to speak Russian. Also on board are Patrick Stewart (Captain Picard on Star Trek TNG), Alexandra Paul (Baywatch), and Pierce Brosnan (007) as the Hero.

The story is one where Cold Warriors freak out over the lack of a cold war and do horrible thing to start it back up again. Tom Clancy has covered this territory, the Bush Administration has been all about re-starting tension from day one, so nothing new, but it is entertaining.

This film has a lot going for it: A simple, but nonetheless engaging, plot, cool action sequences and some fantastic casting. Patrick Stewart and Christopher Lee are, it almost goes without saying, superb. Alexandra Paul really should get more lead roles and Ted Levine makes a pretty good bad guy.

Top marks, though, go to Pierce Brosnan. Despite having to deliver some truly awful dialogue in places he brings the role off to perfection. His "Mike Graham" could be James Bond using a pseudonym (although without the gadgets), and it's no wonder that he went on to become the best Bond so far (and yes I do remember Connery).

This film rates up there with True Lies and The Rock as one of those films that sort of is a Bond film really, even tho' it isn't.

Here are my suggestions for the cartoon bubbles over the actors heads that showed what they were really thinking at the time:

Pierce Brosnan: "My God, what am I doing in this piece of garbage"?

Patrick Stewart: "Where am I? This isn't a starship".

Miss ex-Babewatch: "Why won't anyone take me seriously? Mine aren't as big as Pamela's. See?"

What a dreadful piece of crap. No wonder Alistair Maclean didn't want anything to do with it.

"Death Train" is not that bad.You can watch it easily but you can't expect anything from this movie.Big stars are joined in this one,such as Pierce Brosnan,Patrick Stewart and Christopher Lee.This movie isn't good but it isn't bad too.Somewhere stuck in the middle.I know the film locations so it's a bit interesting to watch the movie and realize that movie stars of this class where in your country.It's not that usual to see Brosnan,Stewart and Lee in Croatia and I think that they all did good job.Most of them did this because of money but hey isn't that what all people do?I realize that there are lots of mistakes in this movie and that plot is quite stupid but try to turn off for a 90 min. and just watch the movie.It will work,just don't think about reality of the situation because there aren't any.But we've got excellent male actors in this movie and everybody knows about them.But they have to act sometimes in movies like this.5/10

When I found `Detonator' at the video store and saw that it had Patrick Stewart and Pierce Brosnan in the staring roles, I got my hopes up. I thought, with Captain Pacard and James Bond in the movie, it should be pretty good. Then I saw that Alexandra Paul and Christopher Lee were also in the movie and thought with a cast like that, how could the film help but be good. Well, I found out.

The premise of the movie is not bad; a fanatical Russian military man (Christopher Lee) builds a nuclear bomb and tries to detonate it, on a train bound for Iran, to trigger a military resurrection of the former Soviet Union. Of course, an elite team of United Nations commandos (Patrick Stewart, Pierce Brosnan and Alexandra Paul) tries to stop the train before ultimate fireworks show takes place. Maybe not the most original storyline for an action/adventure movie, but it had some potential.

Unfortunately, not even this cast could make up for the horrible script `Detonator' offers. This is not the first script David Jackson has written, but it sure seems like it. In fact, the dialog is so dry and uninspired, that the chemistry one would expect between actors of this caliber is absolutely non-existent; which makes this movie boring, and a real disappointment.