This Awesome ’80s Action Thriller Was Based On A Scrapped Akira Kurosawa Script – SlashFilm

Akira Kurosawa’s five-decade-long career boasts dozens of influential titles. The “Rashomon” filmmaker wore his influences on his sleeve: His love for Russian literature, Impressionist art, and Marxist socioeconomics were only the tip of this ideological iceberg. Kurosawa’s brand of filmmaking challenged conventional narrative structures and visual storytelling norms, which he employed through artful screen wipes and slow-motion sequences. 

Evidently, Hollywood owes a major debt to Kurosawa, as it influenced everyone from George Lucas to Sergio Leone. Apart from these obvious influences, some might’ve slipped under the radar, such as “Battle Beyond the Stars” being a sci-fi remake of the Kurosawa classic “Seven Samurai.” While there’s fun to be had with this space opera flick, some Hollywood titles like the Bruce Willis-starring “Last Man Standing” failed to capture the essence of Kurosawa’s “Yojimbo.” 

Among the sea of Kurosawa-inspired stories and lookalikes, there’s Andrei Konchalovsky’s “Runaway Train,” which was based on an original 1960s screenplay penned by Kurosawa himself. The idea dawned on the Japanese filmmaker after he read an article about a runaway train in 1963, which formed the basis for his script written alongside longtime collaborators Hideo Oguni and Ryuzo Kikushima. Kurosawa’s story was primarily about two escaped convicts hiding on board a stationary train, which suddenly starts rolling away and heading towards an unknown destination. Although Kurosawa wanted this script to translate into his first-ever color film (his 1970 film “Dodes’ka-den” had the honor instead), issues with financial backing led to its indefinite shelving. 

Konchalovsky ended up helming the ’80s action thriller, injecting it with an incredulous edge that radically altered the intent of the original script. This is certainly not a bad thing, as this version of “Runaway Train” is both cliché-ridden and convincing. 

“Runaway Train” opens with Oscar Manheim (a brilliant Jon Voight), a bank robber who has spent three years in solitary confinement at Alaska’s Stonehaven Maximum Security Prison. After a plan to break out of prison goes awry, Oscar teams up with fellow convict Buck McGeehy (Eric Roberts). The duo hop on a train with four locomotives just as the railroad engineer has a fatal heart attack. This leads to an endlessly accelerating train with burned-off brake shoes, causing further complications for our runaway convicts, who need to tap into limited options if they wish to avoid a grisly death.

Konchalovsky’s story is somewhat predictable, but this doesn’t rob “Runaway Train” of its many thrills. As the locomotives barrel ahead at full speed, we’re made to feel the gravity of the situation, especially when things take a ridiculously overdramatic turn. We’re met with the inevitable threat of colliding with another train (near a nuclear plant, no less) and anxious officials doing their best (and failing) to fix the situation. Both Voight and Roberts deliver appropriately frenetic performances, complemented by equally exciting action sequences that reveal more about their personalities than any line of dialogue ever could.

The film undoubtedly banks on its schlocky sheen, but it isn’t devoid of somber drama either. Konchalovsky subtly asks us whether convicts like Oscar or Buck, who have been denied basic compassion in prison, can ever find it within themselves to be kind. The runaway train experience only amplifies their anxieties, adding a touch of desperation to their everyday struggles. 

While this action thriller doesn’t exactly scream Kurosawa in terms of style and substance, it is a fun, robust interpretation of a script penned by an auteur.