I love all the movies about trains and movies with trains and I have recently been modeling the locomotives from unstoppable, runaway train, and the polar express and I was wondering if any of you guys liked doing that sort of thing. I dont have any images to upload but I can put links here for you to see what i have done.
A most excellent example…
The circus train in “The Greatest Show on Earth”!!!
Ok, a model train filled in for the prototype especially for the wreck scene.
Hey, its still a wonderful movie for its time, and I highly recommend it!
This guy modeled the four runaway locomotives from the 1985 movie Runaway Train.
Kevin
My Friend Carter has several videos of his Polar Express train in HO scale.
I’ve always wanted to model the ten-wheeler from Back to the Future part 3. Not the time machine version but the old west one. Always thought the Bachmann 4-6-0 might be a good facsimile, and maybe I can get a 1/87 Delorean 3D printed.
The Tyco/Mantua 4-6-0 is based on Sierra #3, the loco that was used in BTTF. It’s a bit oversized, but it is the correct locomotive.
Not precisely, but as a kid I discovered Wild Wild West reruns (the TV show, NOT the absolutely awful Will Smith movie), and seeing as how I had 3 of the Rivarossi old time V&T locos (Reno, Genoa, and Bowker) plus the ornate looking Lincoln funeral car as well as an old time combine and a horse car, I would set up a train and say it was the one used by Jim West and Artemus Gordon.
–Randy
The Pasco County HO scale model railroad club has a sectional train-show layout that has an old west module featuring a model of the Wild Wild West train.
And… I don’t have a picture of it.
[:(]
-Kevin
While so many Hollywood productions used Sierra #3, I was actually pretty close with my use of the V&T loco - the show used V&T #22 Inyo. (Also in the John Wayne movie McClintock) While not identical, it was similar to Genoa, both Baldwin produicts, Inyo being a little heavier with slightly larger drivers. Rivarossi did have an Inyo, but we didn’t have that one (and I suspect the Rivarossi Inyo was just a repaint and renumber of the Genoa anyway). The AHM old time baggage car was close, and the one Tyco old time coach was pretty close as well - but I preferred the more ornate looking Lincoln car.
Oh yeah, the pilot for WWW did use Sierra #3, and then they reused the train footage for shots in later episodes - so one minute they could be chuffing along bhind a 4-4-0 and then a shot from the other side and the loco transformed into a 4-6-0! And the made for TV movies in the 70’s used the Reno as the locomotive.
–Randy
Good morning
I love movies with trains in them.
The one that sticks out the most in my mind is Sierra number 3. That locomotive is a Hollywood movie star and appeared in Petticoat Junction, Green Acres, Little House on the Prairie, and many more half hour TV shows and movies. Clint Eastwood said something like “Everytime I see Sierra number 3, it’s like seeing an old friend”.
Judy watches Little House on the prairie almost everyday when she’s home. It never fails. It doesn’t matter what I’m doing when I hear the Bell and the Steamer breathe, I stop what I’m doing and run into the other room to see, like a little kid! [(-D]
I love the Steamer in 3:10 to Yuma with Russell Crowe. Also that Ghost Train from the movie Ghostbusters sure was an interesting one. I don’t know how many times I played it over and over.
Too many movies I like with trains in them to list. One of my favorite comedies of all time is The Silver Streak with Gene Wilder and Richard Pryor, … Hilarious!
It was because of that movie, I got the Silver Streak Kato set. I would imagine I will feel like I’m modeling a scene from the movie when she runs down the tracks on my layout one day.
Great thread GN24[Y]
TF
TF, that is one of my all-time favorite comedy movies, and probably my favorite movie with a train in it.
“You better do something you idiot, because in ten minutes, you’re going to have 200 tons of locomotive smashing into Central Station on its way to Marshall Fields!”
I’ve never modeled a movie train and so many movies use stock railroad footage that isn’t even appropriate for the period and/or local of the movie. There are exceptions of course. I was watching The Sting a few nights ago for the umpteenth time. It’s one of my all time favorite movies. The villain of the movie is Doyle Lonnegan, played by Robert Shaw, who is a New York mobster who travels to Chicago every two weeks to check on his operations there. When planning the set up, one of the con men states he travels on the Century Limited which of course would be the Twentieth Century Limited which would be the likely choice of a high roller like Lonnegan. The movie is divided into chapters and each chapter shows a storyboard. The storyboard for that chapter shows the Dreyfus Hudson which was designed principally for the TCL. They also correctly show them arriving at LaSalle Street Station which is where the TCL arrived in Chicago. It looks like they just put those letters up on a Union Station entrance, but they did enough research to know which station the train should arrive at. There was only one problem. They showed the 1938 streamlined Dreyfus Hudson on the storyboard. The movie was set in 1936. Who but a railroad buff would even notice that? I’ll give them an A- for their efforts. They at least tried to get it right which few movies ever bother to make the effort to do.
I also watched North by Northwest a few weeks ago. They also had Cary Grant stowing aboard the TCL to escape New York where he was being hunted by the cops. I hadn’t noticed this in earlier viewings but you could see the TCL red carpet through the windows of the passenger car right before the train left the GCT. They also shot scenes with the TCL traveling north along the Hudson and it appeared to be the correct time of day. Again, a good job or getting the railroad details correct.
I think if I was going to model a movie train, it would be the one from Emperor of the North. Whereas most movies only give you a few glimpses of a train, the train in that movie is one of the stars and you would get lots of looks at it to help you build it accurately. I’m sure it would require lots of modification to existing equipment or scratch building to do it right.
Don’t forget the beautifully rendered T1 in ‘A Series of Unfortunate Events’.
I was actually thinking about modeling the original Snowpiercer… but don’t have the enthusiasm for the current version.
Most movie train errors I don’t mind. I especially appreciate in “White Christmas” that they are on their way from Florida to Vermont aboard a train being pulled by F units in Southern Pacific Black Widow paint. Thats some great modelers license there. I model a fictional branch of the New York Central heading into Vermont. If Bing Crosby can get away with it, so can I! [(-D] Now to order an SP F unit…
The only one that really bothered me was in one movie (can’t remember the name) that kept showing scenes of a steam powered train running along with the clear sounds of a mutli-chime diesel horn.
As White Christmas is my favorite Christmas movie, I’ve given some time to figuring out how that movie is supposed to work. They must change trains somewhere, by implication. The Haynes Sisters are traveling in the drawing room originally booked by Wallace and Davis. That ticket was to New York, not Vermont. So, they’re getting off in New York. When they arrive in Vermont, Wallace and Davis are equipped for cold weather. Presumably, they did not pack any cold weather clothes for their trip to Florida and Davis quips about returning newly purchased long underwear. This implies that there was a layover where Wallace and Davis were able to obtain their cold weather clothing, while the Haynes Sisters changed trains to continue onto Vermont. Possibly using their original tickets they’d bought before they made their hasty escape from the club in Florida.
You should do it. That sounds like a great project.
-Kevin
One major goof that jumped out at me was in the movie The Natural. It was set in the 1930s and the one train scene showed footage of Santa Fe’s Chief. The problem with that was in the 1930s, there were no major league baseball teams west of Chicago or St. Louis.
Most movie anachronisms do not bother me. In fact, the most historically acccurate movies are usually terrible movies to watch.
However, I just cannot get over the knuckle couplers in Back To The Future Part III.
-Kevin
I surmise you have not seen the recent Lone Ranger movie, then … [:D]