Le Train

1940: As Germany intensifies its occupation of Europe, Julien Maroyeur (Jean-Louis Trintignant), a modest artisan from a small village near the Belgian border, decides to flee with his pregnant wife and 7 year old daughter. On the train heading west, they are put in a passenger carriage at the front while he must stay in the animal containers to the rear. The next morning he discovers that the wagons have been separated and he is stranded with a motley crew of characters, including the enigmatic Anna (Romy Schneider), a rich German Jew who is on the run for her life.

Pierre Granier-Deferre’s historical war film, based on the book by Georges Simenon, is also a powerful romantic story. He adroitly depicts a portrait of a continent in crisis through the lush photography of the passing landscape interspersed with archive footage of the war.
Within the claustrophobic setting of the train wagons, we are privy to the disarming affects such extraordinary fear and menace imposes upon ordinary people. Among them, Trintignant and Schneider are sublime as the unlikely couple, who are brought together through the extreme circumstances devastating Europe at the time.

Granier-Deferre proffers a complex and measured vision of his characters, who, confronted with the threat of death, expose their fears, desires and faults for all to see. The result is a tragic and beautiful film, dominated by another over-powering performance from Romy Schneider.