Discover
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Gary A. Hecker
Foley Artist -
Peter Hyams
Director -
Ellen Mirojnick
Costume Designer -
John Hyams
Grip -
Donah Bassett
Negative Cutter -
James Forsyth
Extras Casting -
Per Hallberg
Assistant Sound Editor -
Scott Wilder
Stunt Coordinator
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John Chard 5/16/2024 3:22:07 PM
Narrow Margins and Wide Loads. Director and writer Peter Hyams took the bold decision to reimage one of the best film noir crime pictures of the 1950s, and all things considered it’s not half bad. Without getting close to the greatness of Richard Fleischer’s 1952 claustrophobic suspenser that is. Having Gene Hackman and Anne Archer heading up your two principal characters is a good foundation. As the district attorney employee and witness to a mob killing respectively, both actors come up trumps for their director as they are thrust into a game of cat and mouse aboard a speeding train. As the Canadian wilderness outside the train’s windows soothes the eyes, the cramped interiors make for good suspense as Hackman plays the calm to Archer’s panic. There’s nothing new here in terms of thriller conventions, and the pitfalls and familiarity of the plot’s ideas keep it from hitting better heights: people still do dumb things – important details are all too quickly swept aside – laws of gravity non existent and etc. But refreshingly Hyams resists the chance to insert a cloying romance, while his staging of suspense scenes are very well handled. But of course he’s got Hackman being as cool as a cucumber. 6.5/10
Gene Hackman
Robert CaulfieldAnne Archer
Carol HunnicutJames B. Sikking
NelsonTom McBeath
Conductor #2M. Emmet Walsh
Sergeant Dominick BentiHarris Yulin
Leo WattsSusan Hogan
Kathryn WellerJ.T. Walsh
Michael Tarlow