Avalanche Express


Avalanche Express is a 1979 Cold War adventure thriller film produced and directed by Mark Robson and starring Lee Marvin, Robert Shaw, Maximilian Schell, and Linda Evans. The plot is about the struggle over a defecting Russian general. The screenplay by Abraham Polonsky was based on a 1977 novel by Colin Forbes.

Plot

Russian general Marenkov decides to defect to the West and CIA agent Harry Wargrave leads the team that is to get him out. Wargrave decides that Marenkov should travel across Europe by train, on the fictional "Avalanche Express". The idea is to lure the Russians into attacking the train and thus discover who their secret agents in Europe are. Consequently, during the train journey they must survive both a terrorist attack and an avalanche, all planned by Russian spy-catcher Nikolai Bunin.

Cast

During production in Ireland, both director Mark Robson and starring actor Robert Shaw died of heart attacks within weeks of each other. Monte Hellman was brought in to finish the direction and Gene Corman was called in to complete Robson's duties as producer.
Robert Rietty was hired to re-record Robert Shaw's dialogue in the opening scene, as it was decided to redo that scene in Russian with English subtitles instead of having the Russians speak broken English. As a consequence, for continuity, all of Shaw's dialogue throughout the film was re-recorded by Rietty.
Hellman, Corman and Rietty were not credited for their work, but the film's end credit contains a note stating: "The producers wish to express their appreciation to Monte Hellman and Gene Corman for their post production services."

Critical reaction

of The New York Times criticized the film's tackiness, suggesting it was copied from The Cassandra Crossing and likening it to the work of exploitation filmmaker Lew Grade, criticising the actors as appearing "at a loss".
Time Out called it "awful", "formulary" and "hammily acted" but explained its curious editing as resulting from the production problems. The Radio Times gave it 2/5 stars, noting its disjointed quality but praising the acting and snowy special effects.