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12 out of 13 people found the following review useful:
The film is undoubtedly great fun although perhaps embarrassingly patriotic…, 23 May 2005
7/10
Author: ironside (robertfrangie@hotmail.com) from Mexico

*** This review may contain spoilers ***

DeMille's railroading epic owed a debt or two to Ford… He was obviously influenced by "The Iron Horse"(1924) and there are some sequences which seem more than derivative—in fact, they are remarkably similar… But it was a film that nevertheless deserved the warm reception that it got…

Here was Joel McCrea in fine form with something more worthy of his talents… McCrea played a trouble-shooter whose task was to keep the transcontinental project moving… Barbara Stanwyck played opposite as a railroad fiery Irish post-mistress of the mobile railway town…

Robert Preston, gambler, a one time pal of McCrea's, is now in the employ of another gambler, Brian Donlevy, and they have been hired as saboteurs by a railroad politician secretly trying to impede the progress of the building of the Union Pacific…

Stanwyck didn't really come amiss in an all-out action mixture that took in disorderly and noisy railroad workers, turbulent frontier types of both sexes, con men, outlaws and a generous helping of Indians…

"Union Pacific" was undoubtedly great fun although perhaps embarrassingly patriotic… But, in perspective, it is dwarfed by another film which appeared the same year and which had a profound and far-reaching influence on the course of Westerns…

John Ford had returned to the form after 13 years abstinence… John Wayne, who had been languishing in 'B' Westerns since making "The Big Trail," was back once more in a main feature starring role…The film was the immortal "Stagecoach" which was to set all sorts of standards for Westerns to be…

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16 out of 25 people found the following review useful:
Supplementing Stephen Ambrose, 30 May 2004
9/10
Author: bkoganbing from Buffalo, New York

One of the previous reviewers recommended reading Stephen Ambrose's book instead of watching this film. I would recommend reading the book and then supplementing it with Union Pacific.

The whole point of Ambrose's book is that while the financing of the construction of the Transcontinental Railroad was mired in corruption, what must not be overlooked is the remarkable engineering achievement that it was. In that sense Union Pacific is a great tribute to everyone responsible for that achievement including some corrupt politicians.

DeMille in his autobiography says he originally was going to do a film on the Hudson Bay Company and in fact had started preliminary work on same. He changed his mind when he heard that 20th Century Fox was doing one on that same subject. He turned his attention to the Transcontinental Railroad and the President of Union Pacific at that time was one William Jeffers who freely gave DeMille anything he needed to help him with the project. Jeffers and DeMille had the same right wing political views so they got along famously.

DeMille also got Joel McCrea who was one of his discoveries to play the lead. McCrea was the two-gunned railroad troubleshooter who sees the job through. Barbara Stanwyck plays an Irish immigrant's daughter who is the railroad postmistress. McCrea and Robert Preston both have the hots for her, but it's fairly obvious from the first minute who she ends up with. This was Robert Preston's first major part after having done a couple of B films for Paramount. Lynne Overman and Akim Tamiroff are McCrea's sidekicks and supply some comedy relief.

Brian Donlevy is the villain and he's at the height of his career. Later that year he got an Academy Award nomination for another Paramount feature, Beau Geste in the Supporting Actor category. One of his henchmen is Anthony Quinn, who after one reviewer remarked how lucky he was to have the DeMille family connection to get good roles, then swore he would never work for his father-in-law again. Quinn never did.

Two smaller parts are worth remembering. Regis Toomey plays a track layer who has a tragic death early on in the film. And J.M. Kerrigan as Stanwyck's father also dies tragically during a snowstorm.

Good slam-bang special effects. DeMille loved to wreck trains. He did it so well here, he later topped this one with one in The Greatest Show On Earth.

One of DeMille's best pictures. Too bad Cinerama hadn't been invented yet.

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9 out of 13 people found the following review useful:
Westward With Mr. DeMille & The Railroad, 20 December 2000
10/10
Author: Ron Oliver (revilorest@juno.com) from Forest Ranch, CA

Moving across the American wilderness, east to west, the mighty UNION PACIFIC Railroad stretches to meet its rival - the Central Pacific - taming a continent with steel rails. Overcoming Nature's disasters, hostile natives & corrupt politicians, the engines bring with them the people whose hopes are inextricably tied into the railroad's success or failure.

In 1939, Hollywood's Golden Year, kingpin director Cecil B. DeMille presented his biggest, flashiest film yet. It was to be nothing less than the story of how the American West was conquered by the great railroads & her indomitable builders. To realize DeMille's vision on the screen, Paramount allocated hundreds of extras & large coffers of money to the project. Authentic rolling stock was acquired. The president of the contemporary Union Pacific enthusiastically sent his finest track layers to work in the film. The movie would boost train wrecks (two of ‘em), Indian attacks, assorted villainies & a compelling love triangle.

DeMille demanded scrupulous attention to detail and his crowd scenes are very well conceived & produced. His early reels tend to be a bit preachy in touting the virtues of the railroad, but action scenes quickly follow which amply compensate for this. DeMille's subject matter & obvious patriotism help him to avoid the lapses of taste & vulgarities in which he tended to stray in many of his other film forays.

Even with a fake Irish brogue, Barbara Stanwyck charms in her role as a railroad postmistress & engineer's daughter. Feisty & volatile, always great fun to watch, it's easy to see why she's loved by both Joel McCrea (the hero) & Robert Preston (the antihero). Both gentlemen give good rousing performances in roles that might have strayed into the stereotypical, but never do.

Brian Donlevy, as the villain, gives another vivid portrait in what is rather a small role, but very much like the one he would play that same year in DESTRY RIDES AGAIN.

Akim Tamiroff & Lynne Overman are especially enjoyable as McCrea's scruffy, rather repulsive security enforcers; with whip & guns, these are two hombres you wouldn't want to tangle with. Robert Barrat as a murdering bully & Regis Toomey as a sweet-natured Irish worker, give impressive cameos. Anthony Quinn appears for a couple of scenes as a gambler who unwisely pulls a gun on McCrea, and lovely Evelyn Keyes has a scant few screen moments as a telegrapher's wife.

Sharp-eyed movie mavens may (or may not) be able to spot among the uncredited players Monte Blue, Ward Bond, Iron Eyes Cody, Will Geer, Noble Johnson, Elmo Lincoln & Mala playing various Indians, gamblers or railwaymen.

It would be most intriguing to run UNION PACIFIC in a double bill with John Ford's 1924 epic THE IRON HORSE, which tells the same historical story, but with a different artistic tack & fictional characters.

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6 out of 10 people found the following review useful:
Extraordinary film, 14 October 2003
10/10
Author: ragtimeacres from USA

They don't make 'em like this anymore. Everything you could want in a film: romance, wit, drama, action. Barbara Stanwyck and Joel McCrea make an incredible on-screen duo. The train wreck scene at the end is especially impressive. Kudos to Cecil B. Demille for this work of art. I wish I could give this movie more than 10 stars! :)

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1 out of 1 people found the following review useful:
"Me heart's still shaking' on me back teeth," chirps Barbara Stanwyck, courtesy of Cecil B. DeMille, 22 February 2009
6/10
Author: Terrell-4 from San Antonio, Texas

*** This review may contain spoilers ***

What was it that Cecil B. DeMille gave to his movies? Well, how about sentimentality as thick as mashed potatoes, florid exposition, corny humor, American patriotism on a platter, shameless death scenes, ethnic stereotypes, casual and condescending racism, hypocritical bible thumping, leering sex, truly hairy beards and mustaches, ponderous oratory and the kind of obviously manipulative situations that can turn even the best actors into mannequins. Did I leave anything out?

But DeMille knew how to serve up spectacle and action, paced to keep the story moving faster and faster. His movies are awful, even if a few still at times stand up to current tastes. In an unfair world, they nearly all are still watchable, with their flaws often as enjoyable as their merits. That brings us to Union Pacific, DeMille's telling of the great effort to build the first rail line across the American continent.

Or as the movie tells us, "The legend of Union Pacific is the drama of a nation, young, tough, prodigal and invincible, conquering with an iron highroad the endless reaches of the West. For the West is America's Empire and only yesterday Union Pacific was the West."

The Central Pacific would build east and the Union Pacific, from Omaha, would build west. The idea was to meet in Ogden, Utah. The company that gets there first will establish a major rail terminal and make lots and lots of money. If unscrupulous financial opportunist Asa Burrows has his way, it won't be the Union Pacific. If Captain Jeff Butler (Joel McCrea) does his job, it will be. Butler is the smart, brave, handsome, fast-with-a-gun, true and honest chief troubleshooter for the Union Pacific. Opposing him is Burrows' unscrupulous agent, the gambler Sid Campeau (Brian Donlevy). The plan is simple. Campeau will bring in gambling, easy women, bullyboys and liquor to put all those Irish tracklayers working for the Union Pacific out of commission. Helping him is his partner, Dick Allen (Robert Preston), a smooth gambler with loose ethics...who happens to be a close war buddy of Jeff's. What could be missing...oh, yes...Molly Monahan, an Irish colleen whose father is an engineer and who is the postmistress for end-of-track, the moving base camp that services the construction. She's pert, feisty and as Irish as a shamrock. Jeff and Dick both fall for her. She's also Barbara Stanwyck. The Union Pacific's struggle to bridge the continent with steel track, not to mention Jeff's struggle to make it happen and win Molly, will not be easy.

Or as the movie tells us: "For three valiant years Indians redden the rails with the blood of tracklayers. But the ROAD pushes on! Spawning, in its wake, roaring, lawless towns - and fighting the hidden hand that tries to fight its progress."

DeMille's Union Pacific is a sprawl of massive train wrecks (two), heroic track laying, Indian attacks, mistaken sacrifice, back shooting, brawling Irishmen smoking little clay pipes and speaking with terrible Hollywood Irish accents, and some smart gunplay by Jeff. The comic relief is corny and overplayed (no fault of Akim Tamiroff and Lynn Overman who play Jeff's sidekicks), with awful Indian stereotypes. Joel McCrea is first rate when he can be brave and clever at the same time. When he's just brave, DeMille makes him into something with a noble chin. Preston is just fine, but he's doing nothing much different from what he did in any number of his second lead movie roles.

On the bright side is Brian Donlevy as a snake. It's all Hollywood hokum but Donlevy was good at being bad. And there's Barbara Stanwyck. What a strong presence she was in all her movies. She survives this one with energy and lovability to spare...but her Irish accent would make any real Irishman go pale. "Me heart's still shaking' on me back teeth," she chirps at one point.

Somehow, Union Pacific manages to be a watchable movie. DeMille knew how to keep us hooked in spite of ourselves. If it's not nefarious plotting it's our hero's standard response to being asked to take brave action. When Jeff drawls, "Mebbe," we know something worth watching is about to happen. And those two train wrecks are wowzers.

DeMille knew what the movie goers wanted and exploited this with skill. He was no artist and barely a craftsman. He made up for it by being an utterly confident showman. DeMille, with all his ego, knew how to tell a story, even if it was as phony as a drugstore Indian. His pompous, dynamic, melodramatic and self-important spoken narratives and introductions give a perfect picture of the man. He died at 77 in 1959, just in time, perhaps, to realize that his movies would most likely go down as being quaint. In 1957, David Lean had come up with The Bridge on the River Kwai. In 1959 it was William Wyler with Ben Hur. DeMille's era of old fashioned, corny spectacle was on life support, and the ticket buyers knew it.

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1 out of 1 people found the following review useful:
Entertaining Epic, 2 May 2008
8/10
Author: kenjha

The building of the transcontinental railroad serves as a backdrop for this epic drama about a romance triangle. Anchoring the triangle, Stanwyck sports an Irish accent that comes and goes, but she is a lively presence. McCrea, as the good guy, and Preston, as a likable bad guy, compete for Stanwyck's affections. Donlevy is the villain while Tamiroff and Overman provide the comic relief as McCrea's deputies. DeMille provides the energy, keeping the proceedings from lagging despite the long running time. The action is highlighted by an Indian attack while McCrea, Stanwyck, and Preston are trapped inside a train wreck and running out of ammunition. It's hokey but fun.

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5 out of 9 people found the following review useful:
Excellent epic by DeMille, probably my favorite of his films, 31 July 2006
9/10
Author: zetes from Saint Paul, MN

It doesn't suffer from any of his usual flaws. The pacing is perfect, the acting is not at all stilted, and the technical aspects don't dominate the story or the characters. The story centers around the building of the titular railroad. A banker hires a motley group of gamblers and whoremongers (led by Brian Donlevy) to slow down production and then invests in the Central Pacific. Joel McCrea plays a railroad cop, basically, who sees that Donlevy is trouble. He can't outright kick him out, because his army buddy and best friend (Robert Preston) is Donlevy's partner. To further complicate the relationship between McCrea and Preston, there is a girl caught between them (Barbara Stanwyck). It's a great story supported by fine performances all around. While the film runs for 2 hours and 19 minutes, it never seemed boring at all. There are several exciting setpieces, most notably an Indian attack. There are also a couple of great suspense sequences. I loved the scene where McCrea corners Preston and Stanwyck after the payroll has been stolen. It goes on for a long time but the suspense never breaks. Generally I don't think DeMille has skill enough to pull something like that off. My only real problem is that sometimes the good guys are as bad as the villains. McCrea has two sidekicks, played by Akim Tamiroff and Lynne Overman, who can't help but be referred to as henchmen. I mean, even the characters' names are sinister, Fiesta and Leach. Donlevy has a couple of henchmen as well (Anthony Quinn in an early role and Robert Barrat), and they aren't any scarier.

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McCrea, Stanwyck, and Preston--a robust and engaging trio!, 23 October 2009
6/10
Author: moonspinner55 from redlands, ca

Ernest Haycox story "Trouble Shooters" becomes excellent spectacle from director and co-producer Cecil B. DeMille, here working with all his action-packed attributes yet saved in the end by a wonderful and personable trio of stars. In the days following the Civil War's climax, General Grant is asked to help financially back the railroad, which hopes to expand its tracks East from California and across America; Joel McCrea is the superintendent in charge of production, Robert Preston is his former war buddy and railroad traitor, and Barbara Stanwyck is the woman happily caught between them both. After a sluggish opening of about twenty minutes, this adventure gets cooking for a rip-roaring good time. There's political treason and treachery, Sioux Indian attacks, and majestic locomotives galore! We never quite learn the motives behind Stanwyck's romantic-minded actions (and her Irish accent is a little wobbly), but we have no trouble believing her adoration for clever, two-fisted McCrea, who emerges as the picture's hero. Supporting cast is full of colorful personalities, and the upbeat spirit of the movie is broad but unquestionably rousing. **1/2 from ****

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Impressive train wrecks seemed to be DeMille's specialty..., 10 July 2009
6/10
Author: Neil Doyle from U.S.A.

UNION PACIFIC is one Cecil B. DeMille film that could have used 1939's Technicolor to tell the sprawling story of the pioneers who built the railroads that united east and west. Nevertheless, DeMille does get across the enormous amount of work involved in building the rails while a lot of skullduggery was going on behind the scenes to prevent a team of workers to reach the midpoint first.

JOEL McCREA is the perfect western hero for DeMille's story and gives his usual easy performance as the enforcer who has to keep the villains from halting progress on the rails. BRIAN DONLEVY makes a perfect heel and ROBERT PRESTON shows genuine charm and gives a double-layered performance as McCrea's longtime pal caught under the influence of the bad guys who want to cause havoc. REGIS TOOMEY is underused in a very brief role as an ill-fated Irish rail worker.

BARBARA STANWYCK gives her Irish accent a good try and, while not always successful, delivers a very likable performance as the post office gal along for the ride. ANTHONY QUINN has a brief supporting role as a badman, but the most colorful support comes from AKIM TAMIROFF as Fiesta, the man with the whip, and LYNNE OVERMAN, both playing McCrea's scruffy bodyguards. And boy, does he need them! EVELYN KEYES has one line and disappears. But DeMille keeps track of all his extras, using them effectively in all the big mob scenes both indoor and out.

Again, Technicolor was still new in 1939 but GONE WITH THE WIND was using seven Technicolor cameras and DeMille probably had no choice but to film in B&W. Let's just say, this is the kind of story that cried for Technicolor which may have made some of the process shots less noticeable for backgrounds shot in a studio.

DeMille's tendency to let his films run over two hours is present here. At least twenty minutes or more could easily have been cut to keep the story in a tighter mode.

For DeMille fans, definitely worth seeing.

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My favorite DeMille, 24 January 2008
8/10
Author: Django6924 from Hollywood, CA

*** This review may contain spoilers ***

Contrary to what another viewer wrote, this movie is not hard to sit through at all--in fact, I wish it could have been longer and had dealt a little more with the upper level corruption of Barrows and the too-kindly treated Oakes Ames, the politician behind the Credit Mobilier scandal. As it is, it gives a good approximation of what the great adventure of building the Transcontinental Railroad must have been like at the time, and all the actors are excellent in the context of the romanticized depiction of events.

SPOILER WARNING!!! Great train wreck scene, and the scenes between Overmann and Tamiroff are reminders of why today's movies, though faster paced, are not likely to be considered as rich and entertaining 50 years from now--today's movies have no depth when you get away from the main character. Look at the scene when Barrows is able to drive home the Golden Spike, watch the byplay between Barrows, Leach and Fiesta, and see how beautiful the results can be when you let secondary characters have a chance to play a real part in the story, rather than just filling the frame.

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