It's hard to see any effort in the film. There's no comedy to speak of, no real drama and, worst of all.

This is a small, humorous movie in some ways, but it has a huge heart. What a nice experience.

The film's masterful storytelling did its job. The message was clear. No need to overdo.

It is encouraging that the film ends so strongly.Otherwise, it wouldn't have been a particularly memorable film

A rather typical John Wayne western with the Duke literally very comfortable in his favorite genre of western films.Hired by the widow of a dead train robber, Wayne and others seek to locate the gold that her husband stole and return it to the authorities so that they can collect a reward and at least her husband's name can be cleared.The plot is revealed in less than 15 minutes after the film begins and is then devoted to traveling over difficult terrain, shooting between the good guys versus the original robbers and others, Wayne getting the "widow" Ann-Margret intoxicated so as to learn more and other Wayne riders such as Rod Taylor and Ben Johnson revealing themselves.As the story goes on it is highly predictable, but at the very end it is shown that you can't trust anyone or their respective stories.

It's a light-hearted nonsensical Western in which Wayne leads four old buddies and Ann-Margret in search of half a million dollars in buried gold, robbed from Wells Fargo by her now-dead outlaw husband. Her intention: to return it to the bank, clear her name, and give the sizable reward to Wayne's gang.It was written and directed by Burt Kennedy, who did the scripts for Randolph Scott's more memorable Westerns. There were spots in which the dialog became positively lyrical in a vernacular kind of way. "Ma'am, if you was my woman I'd of come for you even if I'd a died in the doin' of it." It takes a peculiar talent to dream up lines like that.They're not absent from "The Train Robbers" although they don't reach the dazzling heights of Scott's westerns from ten years earlier. Off by themselves in the desert at night, lit only by a distant camp fire, Ann-Margaret gets sort of quietly hormonal with Wayne and tells him that when this is all over, he might want to stop by her house. "Ma'am, I've got a saddle that's older'n you are." Wayne had done a startling thing is playing an old curmudgeon in "True Grit" a few years earlier. It was truly a good performance. But it was a character role and Wayne couldn't seem to bring himself to continue along that line. And this movie represents one of a half dozen or so of increasingly dull Western standards, with Wayne in his leather vest, exercising common sense, being brave and authoritative. At the very end, he pulled himself out of that commercial slump and did very nicely in his last work, "The Shootist." He gets decent support here from Rod Taylor, Christopher George, and Wayne's old working partner, the always reliable and always relaxed Ben Johnson, the actor not the playwright.Except for a few scenes -- one quasi-romantic and one a discussion of aging -- it's pretty routine, almost adolescent. "Should we rob another train?" "Ain't nothing' else to do." That kind of thing. But it's diverting enough and William Clothier's photography of the cactus-studded desert of Durango, Mexico, is colorful, picturesque. Makes you kinda . . . wanna . . . live there.

The Train Robbers is written and directed by Burt Kennedy. It stars John Wayne, Ann-Margret, Rod Taylor, Ben Johnson, Christopher George, Bobby Vinton, Jerry Gatlin and Ricardo Montalban. Music is by Dominic Frontiere and cinematography by William H. Clothier.Mrs. Lowe (Margret) hires Lane (Wayne) and his assembled crew to retrieve half a million U.S. dollars that her late husband stole during a train robbery. If they can find it and return it to the railroad, Mrs. Lowe will clear the family name and the Lane crew will pocket the $50,000 reward. However, there's also a considerably large posse out searching for the gold, and who is the strange man travelling alone observing things from afar? A Technicolor/Panavision production filmed out of Durango in Mexico, The Train Robbers is small in plot but huge in entertaining heart. Stunningly photographed by the magnificent Clothier, director and writer Kennedy blends action, suspense and comedy as he straight out focuses on characterisations. With under ten speaking parts in the piece, and man made property kept to a minimum, it's very much a pared down production. But this in no way hurts the film, in fact it's refreshing to see such an airy Oater, one that is made in the 70s but feels very much like a throwback to the 50s production line of Westerns.The town of Liberty, Texas, forms the starting point for the movie, a near ghost town of a place, the arrival of the train bringing Mrs. Lowe and Lane feels like an intruder and accentuates the sparseness that will dictate the tone of the movie. Once the group head out into the wilderness it becomes about conversations and characters reacting to revelations born out by those chats. In the distance are the heavy numbered posse out for the gold as well, but we only glimpse them like they are ghosts of the terrain, they themselves intruding on the Lane group who as the journey unfolds start to bond and learn about life and each other.Once the group locate the site of the stolen gold, it allows Kennedy and Clothier the chance to showcase some more striking imagery. Here out in the sand swept desert is what ultimately looks like a locomotive graveyard , the image is strong and it also signals the point where the film goes up a gear and the action enters the fray. All dusty paths then lead to an explosive finale and even as the dust settles we get a narrative twist that's very very cheeky. The cast are having fun, and hats off to Margret who manages to let her Mrs. Lowe character be more than just a honey-pot in the middle of mucho machismo.I love The Train Robbers, I really do, it's beautiful to look at and features cast and characters that are so easy to warm to. Sure there's flaws and it's routine and hardly treads new ground at a time when the Western was on its knees and struggling to stand up. But it's made with love and respect for those genre fans willing to whisk themselves back to the harmless days of the Western. Those moaning about The Duke's girth are very much missing the point of it all. 8/10

"The Train Robbers" features a lot of horses, and a lot of people on horses chasing other people on horses. It also has a lot of gorgeous western style scenery - in all honesty some of the best sceneries I've come across. It also has a pretty solid cast - headed up by John Wayne and Ann-Margret and including folks like Rod Taylor and Ricardo Montalban. Even the story, I suppose, isn't too bad in that it could have been a lot more interesting than it turned out to be. Ann-Margret is Mrs. Lowe, a widow who wants to find a stash of gold stolen by her husband and return it to its rightful owners, thus clearing him. John Wayne is Lane - the head of the crew she hires to help her out on the quest. But the execution of the story doesn't work.There's too many chases. There's not enough excitement. There's too many inane conversations depicted. We have a couple of old cowboys talking to each other about getting old. There's John Wayne talking to a young cowboy about growing up. Mrs. Lowe seems to make a play for Lane only to be told "I've got saddles older than you." Probably true enough. Yes, the dialogue is less than riveting much of the time. I do give it a bit of credit for an unexpected and somewhat amusing twist at the very end that I did not see coming. But really, it leaves a lot to be desired. (2/10)