Silver Streak (film)

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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
Written byColin Higgins
Produced by
  • Thomas L. Miller
  • Edward K. Milkis
Starring
CinematographyDavid M. Walsh
Edited byDavid Bretherton
Music byHenry Mancini
Production
companies
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]

Silver Streak is a 1976 American thriller comedy 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, Ray Walston, Scatman Crothers, 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 other films.[5]

The film is primarily set on a train called Silver Streak. A passenger accidentally finds out about the murder of an art historian, and about efforts to discredit the victim's book. A shady art dealer is profiting from forged works of Rembrandt, and is willing to kill in order to maintain secrecy about his crimes.

Plot[edit]

Aboard the Silver Streak train to Chicago, book editor George Caldwell meets salesman Bob Sweet and Hilly Burns, secretary to Rembrandt historian Professor Schreiner. Hilly and George share an instant attraction and she invites him to her cabin where he sees Schreiner's body fall from the train's roof outside her window. Although Hilly believes George is mistaken, he goes to investigate Schreiner's train compartment, where he encounters Whiney and Reace, who are searching Schreiner's belongings. After Whiney infers that Hilly is in trouble, the burly Reace throws George off the train. Concerned about Hilly, George follows the train tracks until he meets a farmer, who flies George in her biplane to a station ahead of the Silver Streak where he can reboard.

George sees Hilly with art dealer Roger Devereau and assumes they are romantically involved. He confronts Devereau, who explains that Wiley and Reace are in his employ and their confrontation was a misunderstanding. Devereau also introduces George to a seemingly alive Schreiner (in actuality his other employee, Johnson, in disguise). Convined he was wrong and upset at Hilly's apparent relationship with Devereau, George gets drunk and explains the situation to Sweet, who reveals himself to be an undercover FBI agent named Stevens. He explains that the FBI has been investigating Devereau, a ruthless criminal known publicly as a professional art appraiser. Steven's believes Devereau wants Schreiner's Rembrandt letters, which could expose Devereau for authenticating forged paintings as genuine Rembrandts. George finds the letters hidden inside Schreiner's book.

Reace attempts to assassinate George but inadvertently kills Stevens. George is pursued to the train's roof, where he is knocked from the train after killing Reace with a harpoon gun. On foot again, George finds the local sheriff, who finds his story unbelievable and attempts to arrest George after learning that he is a suspect in Stevens's murder. George escapes the ineffectual sheriff and steals a patrol car, unaware that arrested car thief Grover T. Muldoon is in the back. George and Grover work together to catch up to the train at Kansas City so George can save Hilly. With police searching for George, Grover disguises him as a black man using shoe polish so they can reboard the train. George is captured by Devereau and the Rembrandt letters recovered and burnt. Grover poses as a steward and rescues George and Hilly but, after a shootout with Devereau's men, Grover and George are forced to jump from the train to escape. They are promptly arrested and taken to Stevens's boss, Chief Donaldson, who explains that he knows George is innocent but presented him as guilty in the news to convince Deverau he is safe while causing the police to seek out George to keep him safe.

George and Grover amicably part ways, while Donaldson has the train stopped, surrounded by police, and the passengers evacuated. A firefight erupts, with Whiney being wounded, and George, alongside a returning Grover, boarding the train to kill Johnson and rescue Hilly. Devereau seizes the train controls, setting it to run at fullspeed without a driver, and throws Whiney from the train. With Donaldson providing supporting fire from a helicopter, George mortally wounds Devereau, who is decapitated by an oncoming freight train.

Unable to stop the Silver Streak, George and a porter uncouple the carriages to trigger their brakes, but the runaway engine car crashes into Chicago's central station, destroying everything in it path. George, Hilly, and Grover observe the damaged engine car before Grover drives away in a stolen car. George and Hilly bid him goodbye and leave to begin their new relationship.

Cast[edit]

Production[edit]

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. Ladd reasoned that Wilder was "younger, more identifiable for the younger audience. And he's so average, so ordinary, and he gets caught up in all these crazy adventures." (Wilder was actually older than Segal.)[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[edit]

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[edit]

The film grossed over $51 million at the box office and was praised by critics, including Roger Ebert.[citation needed] It maintains a 76% approval rating at Rotten Tomatoes from 25 reviews.[11] Ruth Batchelor of the Los Angeles Free Press described it as a "fabulous, funny, suspenseful, wonderful, marvelous, sexy, fantastic trip on a train, with the most lovable group of characters ever assembled."[12] 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."[13] (Hilly Burns was actually Professor Schreiner's secretary, not Devereaux's.)

Awards and honors[edit]

Score and soundtrack[edit]

Though the film dates to 1976, Henry Mancini's score was never officially released on a soundtrack album. Intrada Records' 2002 compilation became one of the year's best-selling special releases.[16]

References[edit]

  1. ^ a b c Silver Streak at the American Film Institute Catalog
  2. ^ a b c 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. Archived from the original on May 11, 2013. Retrieved January 23, 2012.
  5. ^ Vincent Canby (1976-12-09). "'Silver Streak' Tarnishes on a Tiring Film Trip". The New York Times. Archived from the original on 2013-10-08. Retrieved 2012-02-19.
  6. ^ "Colin Higgins Discusses His Career". Stanford Daily. 2 February 1979. Archived from the original on 12 November 2017. Retrieved 8 July 2017.
  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. ^ a b "'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". Archived from the original on 2020-09-25. Retrieved 2024-01-22.
  12. ^ Pacheco, Robert; Batchelor, Ruth; Nash, J. I. M.; Balance, Bill; Batchelor, Ruth; Faber, Charles; Warfield, Polly; Jaffe, Larry; Fein, A. R. T.; Hogan, T. I. M.; Ford, Michael C.; Peterson, Melody; Brown, Leonard; Latempa, Susan; Ford, Michael C.; Lemon, Peter; Gentry, Glenn; Kaye, Karen; Stickgold, Arthur; Berry, Jody (1976). "Los Angeles Free Press". Archived from the original on 2021-12-16. Retrieved 2022-04-22.
  13. ^ Siskel, Gene (December 23, 1976). "Plot derails murky 'Silver Streak'". Chicago Tribune. p. 2:5.
  14. ^ "The 49th Academy Awards (1977) Nominees and Winners". oscars.org. Archived from the original on 2015-04-02. Retrieved 2011-10-03.
  15. ^ "AFI's 100 Years...100 Laughs" (PDF). American Film Institute. Archived (PDF) from the original on June 24, 2016. Retrieved August 22, 2016.
  16. ^ Soundtrack.net/Top Soundtracks of 2002 Archived 2009-10-10 at the Portuguese Web Archive

External links[edit]

Quotations related to Silver Streak at Wikiquote

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