Silver Streak (film)

Silver Streak is a 1976 American buddy comedy thriller film about a murder on a Los Angeles-to-Chicago train journey. It was directed by Arthur Hiller and stars Gene Wilder, Jill Clayburgh, and Richard Pryor, with Patrick McGoohan, Ned Beatty, Clifton James, and Richard Kiel in supporting roles. The film score is by Henry Mancini. This film marked the first pairing of Wilder and Pryor, who were later paired in three more films.[5]

This article is about the 1976 film. For the 1934 film, see The Silver Streak.
Silver Streak
Film poster, artwork by George Gross
Directed byArthur Hiller
Produced by
  • Thomas L. Miller
  • Edward K. Milkis
Written byColin Higgins
Starring
Music byHenry Mancini
CinematographyDavid M. Walsh
Edited byDavid Bretherton
Production
company
Distributed by20th Century Fox
Release date
  • December 8, 1976 (1976-12-08)
[1]
Running time
114 minutes
CountryUnited States
LanguageEnglish
Budget$5.5 million[2] or $6.5 million[3]
Box office$51.1 million[4]

Plot

Book editor George Caldwell is traveling from Los Angeles to Chicago for his sister's wedding aboard a train called the Silver Streak. On board, George meets a vitamin salesman named Bob Sweet and a woman named Hilly Burns. Hilly works for Professor Schreiner, a well-known but reclusive art historian who is on a publicity tour for his new book on Rembrandt.

George sees a dead body dangling outside the window and then falling away, but he is drunk and Hilly insists he must have imagined it. In the morning, he sees Schreiner's book, with the author's photo: he was the dead man. Inside the book is an envelope. Schreiner's killers are Johnson, Whiney, and Reace. George goes to Schreiner's room, and Reace throws him off the train. George meets a farmer and they overtake the train in her biplane.

George sees Hilly with Johnson (who is impersonating Schreiner), Whiney, and art dealer Devereau. Devereau apologizes to George for the "misunderstanding" involving Reace. After mentioning "the Rembrandt letters", Johnson says he will return to his room for a glass of Scotch.

George goes to the club car and begins drinking, confiding in Sweet about his situation. Sweet reveals himself as an undercover FBI agent named Stevens. He confirms George's suspicions: the real Schreiner did not drink alcohol. Devereau is a criminal who passes himself off as an art expert, and Whiney, Reace, and Johnson work for him. His plan is to have Johnson, disguised as Schreiner, discredit the book that exposes Devereau for authenticating two forgeries as original Rembrandts. They find the envelope George saw. It contains letters written by Rembrandt, proving Devereau's guilt. But then Reace kills Stevens, thinking he is George. A fight ends on the roof, where George shoots Reace but is knocked off the train by an overhanging signal.

On foot again, George finds the local sheriff, who he tells about Devereau's men killing Schreiner and Stevens, but the sheriff gets a phone call about George killing Stevens. The sheriff then tells George that the police are after him for the murder of Stevens. George escapes, stealing a patrol car which was transporting thief Grover T. Muldoon. George and Grover work together to reach the train at Kansas City. Grover disguises George as a black man and they get by police and board the train.

George is captured, but he and Hilly are rescued from Devereau's room by Grover, disguised as a steward. After a shootout, George and Grover jump off the train and are arrested and taken to a train station, where they meet Stevens' former partner, federal agent Donaldson. He explains to George and Grover that the police were only after George for protection and Donaldson was the one who invented the story in the news about Stevens' murder. George then tells Donaldson about Devereau's plan, and Donaldson arranges for the train to be stopped by his men. Meanwhile, Devereau burns the Rembrandt letters.

Once the train has stopped and the passengers are off, another intense shootout ensues. George boards the train a fourth time, with Grover, as Devereau climbs onto the locomotive, shoots the fireman, and orders the engineer to start moving the train. Whiney is wounded by Donaldson, tries to get back on the train, but gets betrayed by Devereau and kicked off the train, George meanwhile shoots Johnson, and Devereau shoots the engineer and places a toolbox on the dead man's switch to keep the engine running. The shootout continues until Devereau is disabled by shots from George and Donaldson. The helpless Devereau is beheaded by an oncoming freight train.

With no one alive in the locomotive cab, the throttle wide open, and the dead man's switch held down by a toolbox, the train is a runaway. Devereau's men had also disabled the emergency brakes. With the help of a pullman porter (Scatman Crothers), George uncouples the passenger cars from the engine. The runaway engine roars at full speed into Chicago's Union Station, destroying everything in its path. As the of the train glide safely into the station. Grover steals a sports car and drives away, and George and Hilly leave together.

Cast

Production
The train in the film was a disguised Canadian Pacific passenger train with an observation car. Much of the filming took place in Canada between Toronto and the Rocky Mountains

The film was based on an original screenplay by Colin Higgins, who at the time was best known for writing Harold and Maude. He wrote Silver Streak "because I had always wanted to get on a train and meet some blonde. It never happened, so I wrote a script."[6]

Higgins wrote Silver Streak for the producers of The Devil's Daughter, a TV film he had written. Both they and Higgins wanted to get into television.[7] The script was sent out to auction. It was set on an Amtrak train and Paramount was interested, but wanted Amtrak to give its approval. Alan Ladd Jr and Frank Yablans at 20th Century Fox didn't want to wait and bought the script for a then-record $400,000. Ladd said "It was like the old Laurel and Hardy comedies. The hero is Laurel, he falls off the train, stumbles about, makes a fool of himself, but still gets the pretty girl. Audiences have identified with that since Buster Keaton."[2]

Colin Higgins wanted George Segal for the hero – the character's name is George – but Fox preferred Gene Wilder. "He's younger (Wilder was actually a year older than Segal), more identifiable for the younger audience. And he's so average, so ordinary, and he gets caught up in all these crazy adventures."[2]

Colin Higgins claimed the producers did not want Richard Pryor cast because Pryor had recently walked off The Bingo Long Traveling All-Stars & Motor Kings; he says the producer at one stage considered casting another black actor as a backup. However, Pryor was very professional during the shoot.[8]

Release

The film had over 400 previews around the United States starting November 28, 1976 in New York City.[9] It had its premiere at Tower East Theater in New York on Tuesday, December 7, 1976 and opened in New York City the following day.[1] It opened in Los Angeles on Friday, December 10 before opening nationwide in an additional 350 theaters on December 22.[1][10][9]

Reception

The film grossed over $51 million at the box office and was praised by critics, including Roger Ebert. It maintains an 81% approval rating at Rotten Tomatoes from 21 reviews.[11] Gene Siskel of the Chicago Tribune, however, called the film "a needlessly convoluted mystery yarn, which calls everyone's identity into question except Wilder's." Siskel, who gave the film just two stars, added that "the story isn't easy to follow" and that "I'm still not sure whether Clayburgh's character, secretary to Devereaux, was in on the hustle from the beginning."[12]

Awards and honors

Score and soundtrack

Though the film dates to 1976, Henry Mancini's score was never officially released as a soundtrack. Intrada Records' 2002 compilation became one of the year's best-selling special releases.[15]

References
  1. Silver Streak at the American Film Institute Catalog
  2. Higham, Charles (17 July 1977). "What Makes Alan Ladd Jr. Hollywood's Hottest Producer?". New York Times. p. 61.
  3. "Aubrey Solomon, Twentieth Century Fox: A Corporate and Financial History, Scarecrow Press, 1989 p258".
  4. "Silver Streak, Box Office Information". Box Office Mojo. Retrieved January 23, 2012.
  5. Vincent Canby (1976-12-09). "'Silver Streak' Tarnishes on a Tiring Film Trip". The New York Times. Retrieved 2012-02-19.
  6. "Colin Higgins Discusses His Career". Stanford Daily. 2 February 1979.
  7. Kilday, Gregg (Apr 20, 1977). "The Producers: A Varied Bunch". Los Angeles Times. p. e8.
  8. Goldstein, Patrick (Jan 24, 1981). "HIGGINS: WRITER-DIRECTOR ON HOT STREAK". Los Angeles Times. p. b15.
  9. "'Streak' To Top 'Omen's' 400 Sneaks". Variety. November 24, 1976. p. 24.
  10. "The Launching of "Silver Streak" (advertisement)". Variety. November 24, 1976. pp. 16–17.
  11. Rotten Tomatoes: Silver Streak
  12. Siskel, Gene (December 23, 1976). "Plot derails murky 'Silver Streak'". Chicago Tribune. p. 2:5.
  13. "The 49th Academy Awards (1977) Nominees and Winners". oscars.org. Retrieved 2011-10-03.
  14. "AFI's 100 Years...100 Laughs" (PDF). American Film Institute. Retrieved August 22, 2016.
  15. Soundtrack.net/Top Soundtracks of 2002 Archived 2009-10-10 at the Portuguese Web Archive

Quotations related to Silver Streak at Wikiquote

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