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12 reviews in total

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10 out of 12 people found the following review useful:
Sad conclusion to a great career., 2 September 1999

Author: chez-3 from Chicago

The ONLY reason "Avalanche Express" will ever be mentioned again is that actor Robert Shaw died while the film was in production. Sadly even his voice is heard only briefly in two scenes. The rest of his lines had to be dubbed.

It is one of those goofy espionage thrillers with a large cast of mostly has beens that were popular in the 70's. Where else can you see a movie with Joe Namath, Linda Evans, AND Lee Marvin? Yes, bad movie lovers, this is the film for you.

For fans of Shaw , probably any other film he made is better then this one. Pay tribute to this fine actor by watching "The Sting," "The Taking of Pelham 1-2-3," "Jaws," or "Black Sunday." Let this drivel disappear into oblivion as it was meant to.

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7 out of 8 people found the following review useful:
Avalanche Express... The Slow Track For All-Star Adventure, 19 August 2005

Author: James_Bond_007_218 from Wellington, New Zealand

Upon watching Avalanche Express, Robert Shaw's final film I was rather disappointed. Shaw, one of my favourite actors, lines are dubbed and this detracts from the viewing pleasure. This is not only because the voice sounds nothing like Robert Shaw, but because the dubbing has been done so poorly.

When I read a previous review which stated that it was not worth watching, I tend to agree. The film is suppose to be an action adventure but is nothing of the sort. To start off with, it is a very long time before we actually get to any exciting parts, the most memorable being the train escape during the avalanche. The special effects are also worth a mention. The avalanche doesn't look hokey, I was actually more impressed than I thought I would have been. The main problem with the film is its slow pacing. I found myself drifting off to sleep several times during its screening. Any film that does that to you really tells you something, doesn't it!

I think had both the star Robert Shaw and director Mark Robson not died during the production, it would have been something special. It had the potential, but sadly it is not an excellent film. I only recommend purchasing this film if you are a fan of Robert Shaw (Even though his lines are dubbed, its nice to see him in any film) or if you can purchase it for less than $5.00 - $10.00 US (I purchased it on DVD, which was a surprise as I have only ever seen it for sale on VHS).

Final rating: 5/10 - I don't think it deserves to be called a bomb, but it certainly isn't a masterpiece. If your looking for an excellent action/adventure film, check out Black Sunday starring this films star, Robert Shaw. I regard it as an underrated classic.

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6 out of 9 people found the following review useful:
Not A Great Film To Go Out On, 8 April 2007

Author: bkoganbing from Buffalo, New York

During the making of Avalanche Express, Robert Shaw died and I'm sure the producers must have been in a quandary. They decided to salvage as much footage as they could with longshots and rears. Shaw's voice was weak so whole scenes were dubbed.

The result was an 85 minute action adventure story with a lot of holes in the story about a Russian general, Shaw, defecting to the west. Lee Marvin, Linda Evans, Michael Connors and would you believe Joe Namath are the CIA agents bringing him out and for some reason decide train travel is best. This is an obvious homage to Alfred Hitchcock's The Lady Vanishes, but I'm sure Hitchcock would not have been flattered with the comparison had the master of suspense saw this film before he died.

The rest of the players try their best and Maximilian Schell as the KGB guy assigned to kill Shaw before he makes it out of Europe is quite good. As an actor however Joe Namath is a great quarterback, in his few scenes he's painful to watch dealing with the dialog, limited though it was in his case.

I do feel sorry for Robert Shaw because of the many fine performances he did give us on the big and small screen. My first memory of him was in a short lived British syndicated television series The Buccaneers and that had far more going for it than Avalanche Express.

Had Shaw lived and the movie going public got to see what would have been the story they wanted to bring us, would we have liked it? Hard to speculate, but I'd stay clear of this unless you want to see a nice big avalanche nearly engulf a train with nearly all the cast on it.

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1 out of 1 people found the following review useful:
Simple 70s action movie, 14 November 2011
Author: Mractionadventure from United Kingdom

*** This review may contain spoilers ***

I really enjoyed avalanche express, for one its got great acting by some great actors who were, by this point, a little past their time,(Lee Marvin,Robert Shaw), but thats a good thing, because it shows that out of date actors can act. Two the storyline is kept nice and simple and it doesn't take much to work it out, and three, the action scenes are brilliant.

Action comes in the form of a car chase, a train being chased and attacked, a train nearly being destroyed by an avalanche, shootouts and a ship being destroyed. The film is also very intense and for the entire 88 minutes, you are on the edge of your seat.

Avalance express is highly enjoyable, recommended to anyone loves a good bit of edge-of-your-seat entertainment or a decent action movie. Trust me, this film is excellent.

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1 out of 1 people found the following review useful:
AVALANCHE EXPRESS (Mark Robson and, uncredited, Monte Hellman, 1979) **1/2, 23 July 2011

Author: MARIO GAUCI (marrod@melita.com) from Naxxar, Malta

A film more famous for its behind-the-scenes double-jinx (the deaths, within months of each other, of both director Robson – who may have become involved to begin with in view of his work on the spy romp THE PRIZE {1963} and another train movie i.e. VON RYAN'S EXPRESS {1965} – and co-star Robert Shaw: in fact, it was completed by Monte Hellman, while much of Shaw's dialogue had to be re-dubbed due to his being in poor health throughout!) than its actual theme or quality. That said, it is unworthy of Leonard Maltin's BOMB rating, especially when considering that, apart from the talents already mentioned, we also got scriptwriter Abraham Polonsky and, making up the rest of the main cast, Lee Marvin, Maximilian Scell, Horst Buchholz, Claudio Cassinelli and David Hess (the appearance of the last two, who mostly dabbled in exploitation fare in Europe, was quite a surprise)!

It is a typically glum Cold War thriller (unfortunately, the joy seems to have been taken out of the espionage subgenre, Hitchcock imitations – like the afore-mentioned Robson effort – and the James Bond extravaganzas notwithstanding!) with whose plot, involving Shaw's harassed defecting Russian protagonist, the formerly black-listed Polonsky – which had prevented him from working for 20 years! – must have felt a particular kinship (not that his script, adapted from the Colin Forbes novel, is particularly dense). Even more ironic is the fact that Shaw's character's wife is said to have committed suicide (which the actor's real-life spouse, actress Mary Ure, had actually done in 1975!) and, when queried why the Kremlin has not yet announced the KGB official's betrayal, he says they are probably waiting to proclaim his death (which Shaw may well have foreseen as being just around the corner for himself!).

For no very good reason, the visibly-ravaged Marvin is made to rekindle his affair with much-younger agent Linda Evans but, predictably, their relationship runs far from smoothly – especially when he fakes his own death (again, this twist has no direct bearing on the plot!) and Shaw 'flees' from her custody when the titular vehicle is attacked by a terrorist group (yet another irrelevant, if undeniably topical, plot point). The avalanche, too, is just one of several incidents to be incorporated into the narrative – such as having Schell as Shaw's ruthless former colleague don a disguise in order to board the train himself (recalling his previous turn as a Nazi in THE ODESSA FILE {1974}, he is the only one here to be seen having fun with the vaguely preposterous proceedings!).

Incidentally, I watched this on late-night Italian TV despite being available in English elsewhere since the latter is an edited version (shorn of 10 from its already slim 85-minute duration)! In the end, while essentially uninspired, the film is well worth-watching for its mix of forceful personalities, numerous action scenes and, well, the curiosity value that naturally arises out of its singular making.

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1 out of 1 people found the following review useful:
Not Bad, 23 June 2004

Author: Joseph Pintar from New Hartford, NY

This movie is fairly entertaining. It has good action scenes, especially the avalanche (although it looks phony by today's standards). Lee Marvin gives conviction to his role of a Colonel in trying to get a Soviet defector safely to the United States and trying to stop a Soviet biological war plot. Linda Evans is always beautiful and seems credible in her role. Maximilian Schell is very good as the villainous Russian agent determined to stop him. Unfortunately, Robert Shaw is miscast as the Soviet general trying to defect. This was Shaw's last film and he was obviously badly dubbed by another actor because he was so ill his voice was so weak. His performance is understandably hurt by these two problems. Also: can you really take a movie seriously that has Joe Namath (yes that Joe Namath) as a spy. This is a mixed bag that gets a 5/10

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1 out of 1 people found the following review useful:
Disappointing *SPOILERS*, 29 February 2004
Author: wb-11 from Swindon, England

*** This review may contain spoilers ***

*SPOILERS* 70s esponiage thriller, with robert shaw as a soviet defector helping us colonel lee marvin to trap communist spy master maximillian schell. the opening is confusing, with lots of characters being introduced every minute, and its hard to tell who's who (plus, the opening scene is badly dubbed into russian. why couldn't they just speak in english?)

when the train gets attacked, all the windows get blown out and there are some loud explosions and gunfire, yet no one from the back of the train seems to notice, letting the americans at the front of the train run around shooting people. then, a few minutes later, all the windows are magically restored! huh? and how did lee marvin manage to take over the first three carriages of the train anyway? the avalanche itself comes about midway through the film and is not a major part of the plot. horst bucholz pops up at the end in a very minor role. This is pretty bad!

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3 out of 5 people found the following review useful:
Dreadful espionage thriller., 17 October 2003

Author: gridoon

From the hilariously overdubbed Russian dialogue (in the very first scene to boot; what a great way to start your movie!) to the badly miscast actors (Maximilian Schell as a top Russian official???) and from the unexciting action scenes (full of inept bad guys who can't shoot straight) to the trite "May-December" romance between Lee Marvin and Linda Evans, "Avalanche Express" demonstrates how easy it is to screw everything up in this genre. In its defense, it's not as awful as, say, "The Kremlin Letter"; there is also some good on-location shooting in Europe. Despite the title, the "avalanche" part of the movie doesn't take up more than five minutes. (*)

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5 out of 9 people found the following review useful:
Bad Bad Bad, 11 March 2007

Author: garyldibert from United States

This movie hit the screens on October 19 1979 starring Lee Marvin as Col Harry Wargrave, Robert Shaw as General Marenkov and Linda Evans as Elsa Lang. Senior Russian official General Malenkov wants to defect to the Western part of Russia. So the CIA sends one of there top agents, Harry Wargrave to make sure that the General gets to where he wants to go. Malenkov reveals to the CIA that the Russian underground is trying to develop biological weapons and no one is suppose to know about this. Therefore, with Malenkov knowing all this information the CIA decides it would be better for Malenkov to go by train instead of by air across Europe. However, the CIA is after more information then the General can give them so they put the General a train call the Avalanche Express in order to draw the Russian Secret Agents out in order to fine the leader of the group. During the train ride across Europe the CIA has to deal with terrorist attacks and an *********. This movie was as bad as bad can get. I bought this movie because of Linda Evans and I was so disappointed. The only comment I have is don't waste your money on this film because it just wasn't worth it. I give this movie just 1 weasel star and it doesn't even deserve the 1 star.

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1 out of 2 people found the following review useful:
Disappointing Espionage Caper, 25 January 2010

Author: Chris. from Australia

With a cast as talented and diverse as the one assembled for this espionage-cum-disaster caper, the expectations are great. The execution is sadly lacking. Robson's last film concerns a Russian military defector (Shaw), aided by CIA agents (Marvin, Evans & Connors principally), pursued by a Russian patriot (Schell) determined to capture or kill his quarry. Amid all the frantic chases, double-crosses and narrative cul-de-sacs, an avalanche threatens to derail a train carrying the defector and his minders. Cobbled patchwork of a feature film, with erratic editing and a plot so riddled with contrivances, that you're confounded by the fuss. Why it wasn't made more simply is obvious - the storyline is so aimless and superficial, there's just not enough material to sustain a feature length movie.

Disappointingly pedestrian performances from Shaw, Marvin, Evans and Connors lend very little to the quality of the picture, while Schell at least applies some effort in his stereotypical Cold-War silhouette. He also has the best of the uninspired dialogue. Former NFL star Joe Namath isn't bad as one of the good guys, and Kristina Nel (where's Marthe Keller?) makes a reasonable terrorist. With names like Horst Buchholz, Claudio Cassinelli and Vladek Sheybul in bit parts, the opportunities for success were endless. Sadly, none of it comes to fruition.

If you were expecting some improvement from the foreshadowed avalanche, you'll be disappointed to learn that it's anticipation is more exciting than the execution. Although there's a few decent action sequences and colourful location work, mostly the film is just talky and pointless. Notwithstanding the well documented challenges encountered making this film (i.e. the death of both director Robson and star Shaw), it's difficult to imagine how much better this film could've been had they both lived to see completion. Maybe better they didn't, although it's a great shame that this underachievement is their collective swansong.

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