Quel Maledetto Treno Blindato is the film that so impressed a young Quentin Tarantino that he would eventually pilfer the English title (albeit minus the word 'The' and a with a minor spelling alteration) for his own 2009 men-on-a-mission movie, Inglourious Basterds. This was apparently done with the blessing of Quel Madetto's director Enzo G. Castellari, which only seems fair—after all, Enzo wasn't above a little appropriation of his own...
Borrowing heavily from several war classics, most notably The Dirty Dozen, Castellari's movie sees a group of American prisoners—thieves, murderers, deserters etc.—make a bid for the freedom of Switzerland after the convoy transporting them is attacked by Nazis. Their escape plan is interrupted when they mistakenly kill a team of US commandos on a top secret mission to intercept a German train and decide to take their place, hoping that, by doing so, they will be exonerated of their crimes.
This being an Italian exploitation flick, the emphasis is on action, bloodshed and dumb heroics, and Castellari more than delivers, with plenty of firefights, explosions, crazy stunts, and bloody bullet hits. Rather amazingly, his actors seem to perform many of their own stunts, making the film all the more impressive: I can't imagine the cast of Tarantino's film being so enthusiastic about risking their lives by leaping onto and off moving trains, scaling castle walls, or speeding down a perilous death slide. Also adding to the exploitative vibe is a completely gratuitous scene featuring ten naked German women bathing in a river—achtung!
While Quel Maledetto Treno Blindato is far from what many people would consider a classic of the war genre, I found it a very enjoyable way to spend my time.
Borrowing heavily from several war classics, most notably The Dirty Dozen, Castellari's movie sees a group of American prisoners—thieves, murderers, deserters etc.—make a bid for the freedom of Switzerland after the convoy transporting them is attacked by Nazis. Their escape plan is interrupted when they mistakenly kill a team of US commandos on a top secret mission to intercept a German train and decide to take their place, hoping that, by doing so, they will be exonerated of their crimes.
This being an Italian exploitation flick, the emphasis is on action, bloodshed and dumb heroics, and Castellari more than delivers, with plenty of firefights, explosions, crazy stunts, and bloody bullet hits. Rather amazingly, his actors seem to perform many of their own stunts, making the film all the more impressive: I can't imagine the cast of Tarantino's film being so enthusiastic about risking their lives by leaping onto and off moving trains, scaling castle walls, or speeding down a perilous death slide. Also adding to the exploitative vibe is a completely gratuitous scene featuring ten naked German women bathing in a river—achtung!
While Quel Maledetto Treno Blindato is far from what many people would consider a classic of the war genre, I found it a very enjoyable way to spend my time.