Dreadfully Boring

While it doesn't offer any answers, it both thrills and makes you think.

All of these films share one commonality, that being a kind of emotional center that humanizes a cast of monsters.

.Like the great film, it's made with a great deal of visible affection both in front of and behind the camera.

Fitfully funny film, too checkered by raw violence to establish a humorous mood or a successful spoof. The first part is the best, resembling a Hitchcock picaresque where an ordinary guy gets in over-his-head and has to prove himself capable. The early rail scenes with a perfectly cast Beatty are a hoot. He's every bulging inch the carousing salesman, while his attempt to pick up sweetie Clayburgh is another hoot. Wilder too manages well, though no Cary Grant in the romantic department. Highlight too is the giant Richard Kiel's sudden appearance in the cramped passageway. His metallic mouth still has me under the covers. And catch grandma's cross-country flying service. From the looks of her spiffy bi-plane she could go one-on-one with the fabled Red Baron.But once the violent clash part takes over, the humor dilutes, and that's despite hip comedian Pryor's late addition. Then too, the extended shootout between cops and robbers is about as convincing as one of those old cowboy matinees where a thousand rounds maybe hits a couple targets. And for a movie that treats violence seriously, that's a drawback. Except for this sequence, special effects are gripping, especially the culminating train crash that's nothing less than spectacular. All in all, it looks like the runtime was padded with repetitive antics to get a feature length production. Nevertheless, with a tighter screenplay and a softening of the violence, the basic idea could be memorable. As things stand, however, the results are mainly for fans of Wilder and Pryor.

Arthur Hiller directed this comedy/thriller written by Colin Higgens that stars Gene Wilder as George, a book editor traveling by train from Los Angeles to Chicago who sees a murdered man thrown from a train, and reports it, but that only succeeds in getting the killers interested in him, prompting them to throw George off the train, where he meets small-time crook Grover(played by Richard Pryor) who helps him get back on the train, and solve the crime. Good cast here, which also stars Jill Clayburgh, Patrick McGoohan, Ned Beatty, Ray Walston, and Richard Kiel; despite some funny scenes, the film derails like the train itself, becoming too unbelievable. A shame, because it almost works.

George (Gene Wilder) takes a train ride to Chicago, and hits it off with beautiful Hilly (Jill Clayburgh). She's the secretary to a professor who has proof of Devereau's malfeasance. George first sees the professor getting killed, then he runs into Devereau's hatchet men.It's an interesting mystery and mildly amusing. The jokes are weak depending mostly on the flustered Gene Wilder. He does get thrown off the train a few times. Then it completely changes when Richard Pryor joins the party 1 hour in.It was the first time the duo is on the big screen together. Gene Wilder does the memorable iconic blackface. And it changes the tone of the movie. It's an odd transition, and it doesn't really fit. After all, it was murders and gunfights in a mystery thriller in the first half. If for nothing else, this marks the start of a great film bromance. It changed the course of movie history.

Just rewatched this Hitchcockian comedy-thriller written by Colin Higgens and directed by Arthur Hiller on Netflix Streaming. Gene Wilder is George, a publisher who's on the title train where he meets a woman named Hilly played by Jill Clayburgh. Having just met, they start a romance. But during an intimate scene, George sees a dead body fall in front of the window. I'll stop there and just say how I thought the funny and dramatic and thrilling moments mixed well together. Like seeing Ned Beatty as Sweet believably change from a comic drunk lecher to a serious agent who's after the villain Devereau played by Patrick McGoohan. There's also some nice comic turns by dependable character actors like Lucille Benson as Rita Babtree and Clifton James as Sheriff Chauncey, no doubt familiar to James Bond fans from his appearances in Live and Let Die and The Man with the Golden Gun. Ray Walston as Mr. Whiney is also a treat to see. And how cool is it to see Richard Kiel with his metal teeth as Reace before also having those teeth in the other James Bond movies The Spy Who Loved Me and Moonraker. Seeing Fred Willard as Jerry Jarvis who doesn't have any funny lines is strange but since this was early in his career, it's still good. Now here's the real reason this movie was sooo entertaining: Richard Pryor as Grover whether convincing George to don blackface in order to not get recognized as a wanted killer or talking back to the villain after being called a n!gger after making complimentary remarks about Hilly. The fact that he also had a scene changed from a white person being convinced of Wilder's disguise to a black person-in this case Nick Stewart's shoeshiner-not convinced at all was the height of hilarity to me. Since this is Black History Month, I feel like pointing out that besides Pryor and Stewart, J.A. Preston-who I just watched in The Spook Who Sat by the Door and also know him as Mayor Ozzie Cleveland on "Hill Street Blues"-as a waiter and Scatman Crothers as porter Ralston are the other African-Americans that appear here. Really, all I'll say is I highly enjoyed again Silver Streak and do highly recommend it. Oh, and what a wonderfully romantic Henry Mancini score there was, too!