Movies: “The Train”

Oct. 29, 1964 - Opening today is “The Train,” a war film directed by John Frankenheimer and starring Burt Lancaster, Paul Scofield, and Jeanne Moreau. The picture’s screenplay is loosely based on the nonfiction book, “Le front de l’art,” by Rose Valland, who documented the works of art placed in storage that had been looted by the Nazis from museums and private art collections. Arthur Penn was the film’s original director, but Lancaster had him replaced by Frankenheimer three days after filming had begun.

Set in August 1944 during World War II, the film it pits French Resistance member Paul Labiche (Lancaster) against German Colonel Franz von Waldheim (Scofield), who is attempting to move stolen art masterpieces by train to Germany.

In contrast to the action and drama depicted in the film, the shipment of art that the Germans were attempting to take out of Paris on August 1, 1944, was held up by the French Resistance with an endless barrage of paperwork and red tape and made it no farther than a railyard a few miles outside Paris.

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