Cheap Voy Ryan's Express (Video) (Mark Robson) Price

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Customer Reviews of Voy Ryan's Express

Implausible but exciting
This World War 2 POW movie is an exciting combination of The Great Escape and The Train . <
>Frank Sinatra plays USAF Colonel Joseph Ryan ,whose plane is shot down over Italy and who is then incarcerated in an Italian prosoner of war camp where he supercedes stiff necked Britisher Trevor Howard as ranking officer .The two men clash ,as Howard believes he is too co-operative with the enemy ,dubbing him Von Ryan in the process. Ryan soon emerges as a strong,determined leader ,facing down the Italians and their strutting commander,played with suitable bluster by Adolfo Celi .Aided by some of their Italian gaolers ,who are anxious to jump sides in view of the imminent fall of Italy to the invading allies,the prosoners sieze a train .Some of them masquerade as German guards and set out to ride the train to safety in neutral Switzerland .being purued by the Germans in their own train and also by the German air force .There is an especially well staged and gripping attack on the train by a flight og Messerschmitts <
>This has humour -see especially the in the camp when ,in protest at the lack of clean clothing Ryan orders the men to strip naked ,but essentilally this is an action movie .The movie works admirably on this level with some well staged and exciting scenes of combat and pursuit .The good location photography helps as does a slew of stromg performances .Sinatra is excellent as too is Trevor Howard and there are nice supporting turns from Edeward Mulhare as the camp padre and Segio Fantoni as a pro-allies guard <
>This is fast ,suspenseful and exciting

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Great Novel Turns into Mediocre Movie
One of the first books that I read as a teenager (that wasn't off the juvenile shelves) was "Von Ryan's Express" by David Westheimer. It was a best seller at the time and I soon discovered why. The key to the book was the extensive middle where the Allied prisoners take over a transport train one car at a time. It was a very suspenseful and engrossing story of one-on-one, hand to hand combat with everything at stake. Each of something like 22 cars is depicted with a writer's skill. When the movie came out, I went to see it with a friend. As the first railroad car was taken, I leaned over to him and said, "This is where it really gets exciting". Low and behold, after taking two or three cars, the prisoners jump all the guards at the next stop. So much for my expectations. <
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>The thing is, this probably is a pretty good movie. I note the high ratings others have given it so I don't want to be overly negative. It's more of a walk down memory lane that prompted me to write this review. This was the movie that taught me what many others have said: With few exceptions, the book is always significantly better than the movie. If you like this movie, read the book.

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In the same league as the great escape.
There are two great 'behind enemy lines pow escape' movies and the great escape is one and so is this. I don't like Sinatra's music but his ww2 movies were really good.