Overrated and overhyped

Just intense enough to provide a much-needed diversion, just lightweight enough to make you forget about it soon after it’s over. It’s not exactly “good,” per se, but it does what it sets out to do in terms of putting us on edge, which makes it … successful?

Close shines in drama with strong language, adult themes.

Through painfully honest and emotional moments, the movie becomes irresistibly relatable

Despite having the most basic of plots, 'Runaway Train' makes for compelling viewing and has you hooked from the first few scenes. What starts of as a brutal prison riot soon turns into something much more dramatic as two inmates escape and find themselves on an out of control train, with only themselves and a single railroad employee on board.This is a thriller with a difference though, as it's also a fascinating character study. All 3 characters have different ideas on how to handle the situation, and when a fourth is thrown into the mix - the prison warden - things start to become really interesting. The ending of the film is very well done and caps off what is a fine 80s thriller.

A visually beautiful, emotionally wrenching film, based on a screenplay by the great Akira Kurosawa. Some minor flaws necessitate the 2-star dock (8 out of a possible 10 awarded), but this is a film worth seeing. Jon Voight offers here perhaps his most powerful and impassioned role ever, playing a brutal and amoral convict on the escape from a maximum security prison. At points the plot stretches credulity, and the film offers some frequently stilted dialogue: forced and awkward, and too stereo-typically prison-convict-vulgarized--- but hey, maybe that's what the director wanted. It's a fantasy allegory, not a history film. Runaway Train, set on board a runaway locomotive in deeply frozen winter Alaska, partakes of a fantastically raw human and elemental energy. With Rebecca De Mornay, Eric Roberts and John P. Ryan.

I don't think I could dislike the movie that gave us both Machete and Zeus.In all seriousness though, Runaway Train might just be the best film to come out from the crap-factory known as Cannon Group. Unsurprisingly this gem is based on a script by someone head and shoulders above the pack, this being here Akira Kurosawa. But no man is an island, and it takes considerably more than a script to make a movie. Jon Voight and Eric Roberts might provide the best performances I've seen from either one in a chilling setting that beautifully emphasizes the desperation of the characters in both their current predicament and life in general.In addition to compelling cinematography, this Cannon film also surprises the viewer with yet another aspect sorely missing in many of their films: character development. This films grips the viewer on so many fronts and doesn't let go. The Runaway Train might be without a driver, but the film about it very much in control of its own fate, from beginning to end. I was pleasantly surprised by the way the movie almost poetically wraps itself done before the credits roll like any properly told story should.It saddens me to realize how often overlooked this movie is. Before the Cannon Group documentary Electric Boogaloo I don't remember any mention of it, even though I've scanned quite some of their catalogue in search of "so bad it's good" b-movies (and boy, do they deliver that in a steaming pile!)However, Runaway Train is in a completely different category, and despite some minor flaws I do heartily recommend it to anyone even vaguely interested in it. Such poetry in film never comes too often to our screens, so it should be savoured at every chance.

I remember have seen this as a child home with my dad and now it's out on Blu-Ray it was finally time to pick it up again. And seeing it again it's a cult classic. The acting is sublime and yes I know I'm not into Eric Roberts but here he's excellent. Being shot without almost any effects that is what makes this flick a must see even as we know that a helicopter crashed while filming it at Alaska and the distribution was terrible. What starts out as a flick at a maximum security turns after 45 minutes in a pure action flick. And towards the end it goes into pure characterisation.Notice the appearance in the fight ring of Danny Trejo, his first flick. It became a difficult flick to make, not only directors changed a lot and it's know that Roberts was very difficult to work with. But that made out into the flick and he was nominated for his acting. Funny that Jodie Foster wanted to be part in this flick for the role of Sara, but the director found her to pretty and beautiful for this part. If you wanna see one of the better flicks from the Cannon group this is it. Classic indeed.Gore 0,5/5 Nudity 0/5 Effects 0/5 Story 3/5 Comedy 0/5