Large Scale Central

Watching a movie with a train in it

Prototypes
#1

Watching “Once apon a time in the old West” right now and it is pretty cool. In the opening scene a train headed up by a 4-4-0 American pulled into the station and I was surprised to see a few, what I would describe as European cars, short 2 axle curved roof and one even had a brakemans shack. They were just like the short LGB Euro boxcars.
I thought these euro cars wer so out of place on a American RR but maybe not. As we say there is a prototype for everything. The euro cars looked good mixed in with the full length passenger and stock cars. I might have to try that combination out someday.

I looked the movie up on Wikipedia and found out that the opening train scene was shot in Spain. Now just where did they get that 4-4-0 ??

So far a great wwestern movie with some nice train shots. Check it out.
Todd

#2

I recently saw the trailer for the new Lone Ranger movie coming out soon. It had a lot of scenes with trains. One showed a locomotive sliding across the ground on its side. It didn’t show what led up to that but it should be interesting. Dan

#3

“Once Upon A Time In The West” is an Italian film, and the train scene was shot in Spain, hence the “euro-train”. Several of the spaghetti westerns have Euro-style trains pretending to be American trains.

#4

Yeah you gotta take some of those 60s-70s movies. All of Sergio Liones movies (and a lot of others ) were shot in Spain so all the trains look funny. Off the top of my head.

The Good the Bad and the Ugly

My Name is Nobody

are two other Liones films with Spanish trains, despite being labeled N de M

One other major movie with an interloper Spanish train was John Waynes movie The Train Robbers where they track across the desert in search of a lost treasure train when they find it of course it is a European train which just ruined the effect.

One thing I never understood about that movie. How do you “loose” a train in the desert ? Wouldn’t you just follow the flipping tracks to find it?

#5

Yes the “Spaghetti Westerns” were made in Spain ( and a few in Italy ) with European trains. The did a reasonable job of “faking” the engines with stacks to look American. But the cars are always a give-a-way.

Speaking of terrible movie making . . . . I recently bought the DVD of “Wyatt’s Revenge” . . . mainly because people that I know are visible in bit parts in some of the scenes . . . . and there is file footage used represent the train going to San Francisco carrying the interviewer to meet with the “old” Wyatt Earp. And the file footage is of a European train ! My Go ! Couldn’t they find some file footage of a real American train traveling across country to use ? There is plenty of it. The whole movie was pretty bad. I don’t recommend it.

#6

Last night my wife and I watched “My name is Nobody” she let me know half way through that she has always had a crush on Terrance Hill. Decent movie and of course there was a train in it. This time I looked closely at the engine which was certainly a Euro made up to look like a typical American loco. The little round windows in the front of the cab gave it away, then the train cars all had 2 axles with spoked wheels.
They can fool most of the people most of the time but not a real fan of trains.

Todd