4 Star

A Man, a Train and a Mystery.

Tom Gries (100 Rifles) takes the lesser known Alistair MacLean (The Guns of Navarone, Ice Station Zebra, Where Eagles Dare) novel and Maclean’s screenplay and takes us on a whistle stop mystery ride. Now brought up too 1080p quality all courtesy of Eureka Entertainment. Classic Bronson.

It is the 1870’s in Northern California and a special military locomotive is on the line headed for Fort Humboldt. The train takes on water at the small outpost of Myrtle. The soldiers disembark to stretch their legs and search for missing officers.

They could either be in the bar or the whore house which the soldiers are warned by Maj. Claremont (Ed Lauter, French Connection II) to stay out of.

They dont find them but what they do come across is a man cheating at cards. The Gambler says that he is John Deakin (Charles Bronson, Death Wish 1,2,3,4, The Dirty Dozen, The Great Escape, The Magnificent Seven). Just then a shout goes up and a man of the cloth brings in a news paper that has a wanted poster of Deakin with a bounty of $2000 on it. U.S. Marshal Pearce (Ben Johnson, who is in town arrests him and says he wants him to get on the train to the fort as one of Deakins crimes is blowing up a town with military dynamite which makes it a military crime. Thus booking them a place on the train.

Apart from the soldiers on-board there are also civilians, these are
Gov. Richard Fairchild (Richard Crenna, Rambo: First Blood, II, III), his fiancée Marica (Jill Ireland, Hell Drivers), O’Brien (Charles Durning, Dick Tracy) in charge of the train, Rev. Peabody (Bill McKinney, The Green Mile) and Dr. Molyneux (David Huddleston, The Big Lebowski, Smokey and the Bandit Ride Again). They are headed towards Fort Humboldt with medical supplies because of a reported outbreak of diphtheria.

But there is more to this train and its occupants as we go on a mystery ride to find out what is really going on on this ride to nowhere. Breakheart Pass is a Bronson classic and with a cast of popular faces for the time this a great addition to your action packed Wild West collection, now that is in a Blu-ray format.

DUAL FORMAT SPECIAL FEATURES:

·         1080p presentation of the film on Blu-ray, with a progressive encode on the DVD
·         Uncompressed LPCM audio (on the Blu-ray)
·         Optional English subtitles for the deaf and hard-of-hearing
·         A new video interview with critic and author Kim Newman
·         Original theatrical trailer