The three "name" actors in this film clearly just were in it to pick up a paycheck, which I hope they got since Golan-Globus, the producers, had a name for not paying people, and in the USA at least the picture lost money.
With an evident eye on foreign distribution the writers devoted little attention to dialog. Half of it is completely forgettable, the other half utterly obscene. Much of it sounds improvised, especially an impassioned but bizarre speech-a rant, really--by Voight's character in which he **might** be advising his jailbreak junior partner to "go straight" while there still is time.
Except for the carefully constructed replica railroad engines, the sets are cheap, the supporting cast mostly amateur.
Eric Roberts, still boyish though now pushing thirty, reprises his "Paulie" persona from "The Pope of Greenwich Village" with a few southernisms thrown in. It's no dice. The character never assumes life from a collection of mannerisms.
However, Jon Voight is incapable of giving a bad performance. In accents plumbed from growing up Catholic in Yonkers, NY, portraying a street-wise con who could be broken neither by a harsh system nor a brutal warden, he sounds truly tough and still looks six foot three and pretty good at age 47, about when his leading man career stalled.
A best-selling book will often have as subject something people know a little about, but would like to know more. It's railroading in this case and we do learn quite a bit about it. We are taken in the control room, in the switch yard and of course on board the "Runaway Train". By keeping to unities--a single story on a single day--the picture effectively builds tension toward a climax that is inevitable yet poignant.
The cinematography might be the best thing about this picture, showing us the bleakly beautiful, seemingly endless frozen wastes of Alaska in mid-winter--before anyone knew about Global Warming.
With the release this month of a movie on a similar theme there is bound to be a renewal of interest in this now twenty-five year old motion picture with one tenth the budget.
With an evident eye on foreign distribution the writers devoted little attention to dialog. Half of it is completely forgettable, the other half utterly obscene. Much of it sounds improvised, especially an impassioned but bizarre speech-a rant, really--by Voight's character in which he **might** be advising his jailbreak junior partner to "go straight" while there still is time.
Except for the carefully constructed replica railroad engines, the sets are cheap, the supporting cast mostly amateur.
Eric Roberts, still boyish though now pushing thirty, reprises his "Paulie" persona from "The Pope of Greenwich Village" with a few southernisms thrown in. It's no dice. The character never assumes life from a collection of mannerisms.
However, Jon Voight is incapable of giving a bad performance. In accents plumbed from growing up Catholic in Yonkers, NY, portraying a street-wise con who could be broken neither by a harsh system nor a brutal warden, he sounds truly tough and still looks six foot three and pretty good at age 47, about when his leading man career stalled.
A best-selling book will often have as subject something people know a little about, but would like to know more. It's railroading in this case and we do learn quite a bit about it. We are taken in the control room, in the switch yard and of course on board the "Runaway Train". By keeping to unities--a single story on a single day--the picture effectively builds tension toward a climax that is inevitable yet poignant.
The cinematography might be the best thing about this picture, showing us the bleakly beautiful, seemingly endless frozen wastes of Alaska in mid-winter--before anyone knew about Global Warming.
With the release this month of a movie on a similar theme there is bound to be a renewal of interest in this now twenty-five year old motion picture with one tenth the budget.