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Rating:  -
While I agree with other 4- and 5-star reviewers that the plot, acting and video quality of Breakheart Pass is very good, this review is from a railfan's viewpoint regarding the accuracy and value of the railroad footage. When Trains Magazine publishes a special edition in January, 2010, naming its choice of the 100 all-time best train movies, I would expect Breakheart Pass to rank near the top. The exterior photography is excellent. The train trip occupies 100% of the story, from the opening to the closing scene. More than 90% of the scenes that do not show the exterior of the train take place inside the train.
Weaknesses: There is only one train involved. Although the trip supposedly takes two days, no other trains are met or passed. Only once in the plot does the train stop to take on water and only one other time does the steam locomotive require a fuel stop (for wood). The year in which the action takes place is not specified, but the train equipment appears too modern (early 20th Century rather than late 19th Century) for a wood-burning locomotive to be appropriate. The brown and tan paint on the locomotive seems out of place, but only during the opening station stop at Myrtle is this a distraction. Apparently the train is expected to run through wilderness for two days without an engine crew change. It does stop overnight so that the engineer can sleep for "not more than six hours". It is not realistic to imagine a railroad so isolated that it has no support facilities.
Filmed on the Camas Prairie Railroad southeast of Lewiston, Idaho, the movie railroad is called the Wasatch & Nevada R.R. and although not identified, the story presumably takes place in Utah. As such, mountain scenes perhaps should have more Aspen and fewer evergreen trees.
Based on the percentage of train footage, Breakheart Pass ranks favorably with the likes of Emperor of the North, The Train, El Ultimo Tren, The Titfield Thunderbolt and Tough Guys for railroad content. Plus it is packaged around a good "who done it" mystery yarn.
Rating:  -
The description says:
Breakheart Pass [VHS] (1968)
Starring: Gian Maria Volontè, Klaus Kinski Director: Damiano Damiani
I was expecting a movie by Gian Maria Volontè.But the picture shows Charles Bronson. And starring is Charles Bronson.
Gian Maria Volontè is italian and Charles Bronson is american.You can't mistaken one for another.
Very poor job of amazon.com
Rating:  -
Something's not right at isolated Fort Humbolt and diphtheria may be the least of the problems. Breakheart Pass is based on the adventure thriller by Alistair MacLean, who also wrote the screenplay. It's not bad as a Bronson vehicle except for its excesses: An obvious 1970s score glued on a movie that's set a century earlier; one action set piece after another, most a lot of fun but so many that the storyline becomes just the excuse for the set pieces; and corny directorial indulgences that have nearly every character in the movie exchanging suspicious glances with one another at key moments, accompanied by music stings.
What Breakheart Pass has going for it are some fine character actors like Ben Johnson, Charles Durning and David Huddleston; the look of the film...the hovel of the tiny rail town of Myrtle in the Rockies, dry, gray, worn-out plank buildings, a shack of a train station, a utilitarian brothel that's all business; the tired steam engine and worn carriages but with a plush interior of the wood-paneled dining car and parlor; the rugged snow-covered Sierra Nevada mountains; the stunt work directed by Yakima Canute in his last picture; and, of course, Charles Bronson, phlegmatic, stoic, always watching and seldom speaking. Bronson sure wasn't handsome but he had a memorable, worn and craggy face, even with that Fu Manchu moustache he often wore. He also had the screen presence of a basically tough good man who could do, when aroused, violence that would hurt. Few major movie stars were as unlikely as Bronson.
What's the fuss at Fort Humbolt? It has something to do with conspiracy, treachery, rifles and gold...the usual. All we know is that we're on board a train carrying medical supplies and provisions to aid the sick soldiers at the fort. Aboard is the territorial governor, the daughter of the fort's commander, a doctor, a minister, a train official, a major, some of his soldiers and a lawman with his prisoner, a man called Deakin (Charles Bronson). We don't really care, even when the passengers start being murdered. We learn those supplies seem to consist of rifles and ammunition and that Deakin is no bad guy, but this is predictable. All those great stunt set pieces just pile on and make the plot irrelevant. There are fights atop the moving train, the steam engine billows out huge white clouds of steam as it chugs and rattles across a high, rickety wooden bridge, men fall and bounce off that bridge, corpses are discovered in firewood piles, in rifle boxes and in train compartments, Indians rampage and attack, there's a cavalry charge across the snow, a runaway troop car crashes down a mountainside, you name it. Best of all, most of the movie takes place in and around that steam engine, clattering and swaying over the tracks through the mountains. Engine Number 9 should have received star billing alongside Bronson. Just about everyone on the train is suspicious and only Deakin is smart and tough enough to figure things out and then do something about it. With the stunts, with Bronson and with that steam engine, Breakheart Pass could make a great theme park ride.
That sentiment holds true of most of Alistair MacLean's books. He was an immensely successful writer of thrillers that featured the same formula: Workmanlike plots, lots of action, little or no sex (it got in the way of the action, MacLean thought) and indestructible heroes. He wrote about 30 thrillers. The last half were nothing but tired exercises in theme park rides. His reputation now probably rests on two movies made from his books, Where Eagles Dare and The Guns of Navarone. For those who enjoy well-written adventure thrillers by authors on their way to being forgotten, try some of the books by Desmond Bagley, James Leasor, Geoffrey Jenkins, and Victor Canning.
Breakheart Pass has an okay DVD transfer, with wide screen on one side of the disc and pan-and-scan on the other. There are no extras.
Rating: -
Charles Bronson plays a convicted murdered who is being transported on a military train that is carrying medical supplies to an Army fort that is in the midst of a diphtheria epidemic. Other passengers on the train include the governor, his fiance, a US marshal, a priest, a doctor, and an army officer. Things are not what they seem as a complex plot is slowly revealed. This is the kind of Western that anyone who likes Westerns or action films can watch over and over again. Is this a `great' film? No. Is this film making some profound statement about the human condition? No. Is a train ride to Breakheart Pass exciting? Hell Yes! There is so much to like about this film. The plot contains lots of interesting twists and turns that'll keep you guessing (assuming you haven't watched it a zillion times already). Lots of great actors (Charles Bronson, Ben Johnson, Jill Ireland). One of the best fight scenes ever filmed with Charles Bronson duking it out with former World Champion prize fighter Archie Moore on the top of a snow covered train as it rambles through the mountains. Several good gunfights, and a great love story to boot! The score is also outstanding, every time I watch this film I can't get the music out of my head. The cinematography is great too. Highly recommended.
Rating: -
So I dig it muchly when the film takes place on a train. And if that same film also crosses over into the whodunit genre, well, so much the better. BREAKHEART PASS, released in 1975, is actually a western mystery, starring Charles Bronson, he of the rugged frame and the tough, careworn features. And, because what's a Bronson flick without lovely Jill Ireland, she shows up, too, looking all nice.
Alistair Maclean offers up the screenplay (adapted from his novel), about a train in the Old West conveying replacement troops and medicine to Fort Humboldt, a distant military garrison stricken with diphtheria. The trek is quite a ways, four hundred miles of freeze and isolation. So it's even more harrowing when the passengers begin to be picked off, one by one. "Trust no one," the movie trailer warns ominously, "and believe half of what you see. Because nothing is as it appears, and nobody is who they seem to be." But could the surviving passengers' only hope lie in the mysterious prisoner in their midst?
A year before, Charles Bronson knocked it out of the park with his blockbuster flick Death Wish. So the viewing public was high on him when this one was released. BREAKHEART PASS doesn't let his fans down. It's thrilling and suspenseful and culminates with a slam bang finish. This flick isn't your typical, straightforward western; it's got some twists. While the film doesn't quite bowl you over with jaw-dropping reveals, the frequent plot shifts do keep you involved and guessing. Meanwhile, the imposing snowy backdrop of the Rockies lend greatly to a feeling of deadly danger and isolation.
While Charles Bronson will never be considered a consummate actor, he does maximize his talents. His biggest strength is that tough persona he's built up for the cinema. He's absolutely ideal for those roles calling for a man of action (but of few words). Having said this, Bronson does play his John Deakin with enough complexity that you're never quite sure what he's up to, although we don't quite buy Deakin's assertions of pacifism, never mind that he's a former university lecturer. Is he trying to unearth a conspiracy, or is he part of it? Honestly, can you be sure he's the good guy?
Backed by a reliable bunch of acting veterans (Ben Johnson, Richard Crenna, Charles Durning) and graced by an oft-partnered actress (and wife), Bronson confidently carries the film. Even though 54 years old when this movie debuted, with those lines on his face sinking in ever deeper, dude was still spry and athletic enough to pull off his action sequences. And for a man of action but few words, well, that's almost everything.
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