Short Take: Night Train (1959)

[Posted excitedly at The Blackboard.]

I'd like to offer a quick recommendation for the Polish noir Night Train (Jerzy Kawalerowicz, 1959), readily available on DVD from Polart. Just to sketch it out: This is one of the great train films of all time, right up there with The Narrow Margin and The Lady Vanishes. Image by image, it's breathtakingly cinematic, but it's also richly human and emotional. There is a manhunt sequence at the 3/4 mark, off the train and into the darkling countryside, that is one of the most impressive sequences in post-war cinema -- real goose-bump territory. The ethereal jazz score, featuring vibes and a wordless female vocalist, is utterly distinctive and adds strikingly to the film's overall effect. This is a ride you won't forget.

It is interesting how great films announce themselves right at the start -- it took all of thirty seconds of the credits, pairing an overhead shot of a busy train station with the otherworldly jazz, for me to know in my gut that Night Train was something special.

POSTSCRIPT: The reviews for this film at the IMDB are appreciative and quite good -- much better than what I've come across in standard film references, which don't seem to especially "get" the film.

The leading man, Leon Niemczyk, who gives a compelling performance, looked familiar to me, and then I figured out why -- he starred in Roman Polanski's mesmerizing debut feature, Knife in the Water, three years later. (He was one of the busiest actors in Polish film history; he passed away in 2006.) Knife in the Water is a film that bowled me over when I saw it as an adolescent; I should give it another look.