Nelson, library to show free train films
This fall the Nelson-Atkins Museum and KC Public Library will be showing free classic films that celebrate trains.
The series is offered in conjunction with the exhibit "Art in the Age of Steam: Europe, American and the Railway, 1830–1960," which runs from Sept. 13 to Jan. 18, 2009.
The films will be shown either in Atkins Auditorium at the Nelson or in the Durwood Film Vault of the Central Library, 14 W. 10th.
The lineup:
“Brief Encounter” (1:30 p.m., Sept. 27, Nelson-Atkins): One of the great screen romances. After meeting at a British railway station two strangers (Trevor Howard, Celia Johnson) embark on a furtive relationship. Directed by David Lean.
“The Train” (1:30 p.m., Oct. 25, Nelson Atkins): Members of the French Resistance try to stop a train on which Nazis are taking looted art masterpieces to Germany. John Frankenheimer directs Burt Lancaster and a mostly French cast in this great action film with philosophical underpinnings.
“The Iron Horse” (1:30 p.m., Nov. 1, Central Library): John Ford’s silent epic from 1924 looks at the opening of the West and the building of the transcontinental railroad.
“Union Pacific” (1:30 p.m., Nov. 8, Central Library): Fifteen years after Ford’s version, Cecil B. Demille offered a sound film on the same topic. Barbara Stanwyck, Joel McCrea and Robert Preston star.
“Silver Streak” (1:30 p.m., Nov. 15, Central Library): Gene Wilder and Richard Pryor star in one of the seminal comedies of the ‘70s, a murder mystery set aboard a train bound from LA to Chicago.
“Murder on the Orient Express” (1:30 p.m., Nov. 22, Central Library): Sidney Lumet directed what is possibly the best adaptation of an Agatha Christie novel, a murder mystery set aboard a snowbound train and featuring a cast to die for: Albert Finney, Lauren Bacall, Jacqueline Bissett, Sean Connery, John Gielgud, Ingrid Bergman, Anthony Perkins, Vanessa Redgrave, Richard Widmark, Michael York and Martin Balsam.
“The Titfield Thunderbolt” (1:30 p.m., Nov. 29, Central Library): When the railroad decides to suspend service to their little town, a group of British rail fans decide to run the trains on their own. This comedy stars Stanley Holloway, Hugh Griffith; it was directed by Charles Chrighton (“The Lavender Hill Mob”).
“Closely Watched Trains” (1:30 p.m., Jan. 10, Nelson-Atkins): In this influential Czech release from 1966 a young train dispatcher in WW2 focuses on losing his virginity, largely oblivious to the Nazi occupation and the resistance raging around him.
| Robert W. Butler, The Star
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