Breakheart Pass – 1975
Death rode the rails to Breakheart Pass

Director
Tom Gries

Writer
Alistair MacLean also novel

Producers
Jerry Gershwin
Elliott Kastner

Cast
Charles Bronson – John Deakin
Ben Johnson – Deputy U.S. Marshal Nathan Pearce
Richard Crenna – Gov. Richard Fairchild
Jill Ireland – Marica Scoville
Charles Durning – Frank O’Brien
Ed Lauter – Maj. Claremont
Bill McKinney – Rev. Peabody
David Huddleston – Dr. Molyneux
Roy Jenson – Chris Banion
Rayford Barnes – Sgt. Bellew
Scott Newman – Trooper Rafferty
Robert Tessier – Levi Calhoun
Joe Kapp – Henry (the steward)
Archie Moore – Carlos
Sally Kirkland – Jane-Marie
Sally Kemp – Prostitute
Eddie Little Sky – White Hand

Review by Theo Robertson

Breakheart Pass (1975)
Lacks A Hook,
Seeing as it’s a thriller BREAKHEART PASS lacks any sort of hook. What’s a hook? It’s an opening scene that grabs an audience. DOCTOR WHO and THE X FILES are brilliant at this showing us a scaled claw, or a robotic foot or a bizarre murder. Here the seventies film starts with a train arriving at a station where absolutely nothing happens for the next 15 minutes.

Despite this major flaw – Maybe films in the mid 70s sold on the names of Bronson and MacLean rather than script structure? – Once the seventies film gets into its stride it is rather entertaining. The plot twists and turns even though it falls apart if given too much thought and the climax leaves no cliche unturned.