I'm a bad-tempered old man.
- Why are we slowing down? - Are you blind? There's been an air raid.
We slow down for switching.
What are you going to do?
I don't want to stop at St Avold.
You wanna go to Germany?
Jacques will send word.
This is taking us south.
I said this is taking us south!
You saw the main tracks are blown up.
We have to go around the bend in the river.
- What's the next town on your map? - Remilly.
Keep your eyes open. Your horizon's about to be broadened.
Rive-Reine.
Ah, Maurice.
You have a direct line to Commercy.
Right. Call them.
My wife's cousin has some cheese for me.
Could be put on the midnight train when it stops at Commercy.
Yes. Yes, Maurice. The train will stop, to unload passengers.
Good. I'll save a piece of cheese for you.
Railroad business, huh?
Next stop, St Avold, sir.
Do we run?
Sergeant. Can we stretch our legs?
All right. Get down.
Corporal, watch them.
You! Where's the telephone?
Sergeant! Nobody leaves the train. We will stop here only for two minutes.
Ja, Kapitän.
And to save a piece for Pierre and Raoul.
Hello, Colonel. Colonel, we are at St Avold.
Yes, Colonel.
What's it like here in St Avold?
Well?
I know what you mean.
I'll be glad to get back to Berlin.
- Schwarz! - Yes, Captain?
- We go. - Get up.
Auf Wiedersehen.
We are home, Tauber.
We are in Germany.
- Are you all right? - Yes, I'm all right.
You're crazy! Why did you speed into a curve like that?
- But you told me to go ahead. - Yes, but at full speed?
What do you mean? Hey! You should have signalled to go slow! How should I know?
Look at my rails!
How close?
Two minutes.
Good luck.
If we get separated, meet you at the old farmhouse above the river.
Take the stick.
Halt
Pilzer! Get Labiche!
Yes, sir.
Get him! Kill him, kill him!
Kill him! Kill him! Kill him! Kill him!
No. No, you can't stay here.
Fire!
Pilzer!
- How soon will the cranes be here? - Major Herren is on his way now, sir.
Everything else will be completed by dark...
Put more men to work. I want it done faster.
But, Colonel, till the crane can move the engine...
Yes, Colonel.
Sir! No sign of Labiche, sir.
We searched the woods for hours.
- I've had two squads looking... - I want him!
- He could have gone back to Paris. - No.
He's around somewhere, I know.
He'll twist and turn. He'll hide and make his plans.
But he won't leave the train. I'm beginning to know him.
Keep looking for him! Search the town.
I've brought you some clothes.
- How's your leg? - Much better, thank you.
- What's going on out there? - You should know.
Engines and cars all over the tracks. Rails torn.
- Any reprisals? - Do you think they'd declare a holiday?
Jacques, the stationmaster, and an engineer shot.
Another engineer, the thin one, was shot trying to escape.
Pesquet.
- There'll be others.
Labiche. Have you seen the man Labiche?
- Labiche? - Yes, Labiche!
- He was in room five. He left yesterday! - Yes, he left yesterday.
I know he left yesterday! I want to know if you've seen him today!
Labiche, Labiche. Yes, I've seen Labiche.
I see him every day. And General de Gaulle too.
They're my best customers and I keep them cool in the wine cellar.
Please.
Why did you come back here?
Do you want everyone killed?
Maybe you think you're a hero. Maybe you don't care if you live.
What right have you to do this? Leave us alone.
I knew Jacques all my life.
Hélène, his wife, sat with me when my husband was killed,
the first year of the war.
And now I'll sit with her.
Men are such fools.
Men want to be heroes and their widows mourn.
Perhaps men are fools.
There were over a hundred involved in stopping that train.
Switchmen, brakemen, yard gangs, stationmasters.
God knows how many will be shot, like Jacques.
You know what's on that train?
Paintings. That's right - paintings. Art.
The national heritage. The pride of France.
Crazy, isn't it?
It's quiet up there.
Where are you going?
Perhaps I can leave now.
You can't go out in daylight. They're looking for you.
My friend who was with me on the train, I have to meet him. He may not be alive.
It won't help him if you're killed. Wait until it's dark.
Eat your food.
It's a sin to waste bread.
Ready? Take it up.
Put it on its side over there.
Major!
Can't you move any faster?
This is a hell of a mess you've got here, Colonel. We're doing the best we can.
I asked for two cranes.
It took an order by Staff Headquarters to get this one.
With Von Rundstedt falling back, the army has other uses for railway equipment.
This train is more valuable.
It's all right.
At Commercy, they shot the stationmaster.
At Metz, they took hostages.
Ten of them. Shot them on the spot.
Kids, mostly.
You know Lefèvre, the inspector there?
His kid, the one with asthma?
They cured it for him.
At Chalons, three dead.
That's all I know so far.
Pesquet was right.
This was his last job.
What about the train?
It'll be ready to move tomorrow.
Where the hell are the Allies?
What are they taking, the tourist route to Paris?
I'll believe them when I see them.
In case they don't come.
Labiche, it's me!
- Who's with you? - Robert, Jacques' nephew.
Come in.
I'm glad to see you're still alive.
You're to be complimented.
- That was quite a job you did. - Where are the Allies?
What shape is the train in?
It'll be repaired by morning.
Thank you.
- When does it leave Rive-Reine? - It won't move in daylight.
Where are the Allies?
It has been arranged for a French division to reach Paris first. A gesture.
A gesture?
They can make gestures?
Let them make one for Pesquet or Jacques.
That kid of Lefèvre's, he'd appreciate a gesture.
What do you intend to do?
This - plastique. What we should have done in the first place.
Tomorrow night - no Allies, we blow the train to hell.
London wants the train saved.
What do they want us to do? Stop it with our hands? Lay down across the tracks?
Right after dawn, all switching tracks and trains in the area will be bombed.
The art train is not to be destroyed.
Orders are to mark it so the planes will pass it up.
- Mark it? - White paint...
on the top of the first three cars.
London has decided the paintings must not be damaged.
Save it?
For Von Waldheim? Make him a present?
To hell with London. We started this whole thing for one reason.
To stop the train because the Allies were going to be here.
Where are they? Every day they've been due.
Every day, a man has died for thinking they were about to arrive. To hell with it!
Now they want us to paint the train? Let 'em blow it up!
Paul.
It'd be too bad if it got blown up.
That is, if it could be saved.
Papa Boule, Pesquet, the others...
they wanted it saved.
And they're dead, and they'll never know.
But we will.
White paint. Just the first three cars.
I can find my way back.
You know what it's like down there?
There are Germans all over the place. You haven't got a chance!
I'll figure something.
What do you wanna do? Tell the Germans you want to paint the train
so it will look nice when it gets to Germany?
Don't you see? It's hopeless.
Those cars have been needing a coat of paint ever since the war started.
You crazy bastard.
Who are you gonna get to help you?
Have you thought of that? Who are you gonna get to help you?
Me.
I can fight.
That's two of us. A small army.
- What do you shoot with this? - Rabbits.
You're not fighting rabbits.
- How well do you know the station? - Have you got a plan?
- I lived there all my life. - Can you get some men to help?
Not in Rive-Reine. They're working on the tracks. Even I serve food to the army.
Other towns?
Montmirail. Uncle Jacques had friends there - railroad men. I can get them.
- And paint? - Yes. And brushes too.
See about the men and the paint.
Be back an hour before dawn.
With luck...
no one will be hurt.
No one's ever hurt. Just dead.
Paul, have you ever seen any of those paintings on the train?
I haven't. When it's over, I think maybe we should take a look.
Pilzer!
Herren!
Lights!
Pilzer!
Didont, get out! Get out!
Didont! Run, run!
Not thunder, Colonel. Artillery.
- How close? - Ten miles, perhaps 15.
88s I think. Our guns falling back, retreating.
- When will you be finished? - Half an hour.
Does it matter? You can't take the train out in daylight.
The Allies could be here before night.
Possibly. But a moving train has no chance.
Colonel, get down! Get down!
Why?
The paint, Herren. It's a signal.
They're not going to bomb the train.
Don't scrape it off. Leave it there. It's my ticket to Germany.
After him! Search the woods!
Wait! Colonel, while they search the woods,
Labiche can blow another section of the train, and another and another.
Do you suggest he will stop if we let him run free?
He would have blown up the engine. The hostages you put aboard prevented that.
I can have this repaired in less than an hour.
Keep Labiche away from the train for the next four or five miles,
till we reach Montmirail, then we will leave him behind.
Labiche or the train. Which do you want, Colonel?
Stop!
Bring over the rails!
(barks orders)
Come here.
I think I saw something.
Stop here!
I'll ride the front to Montmirail.
Ten miles a hour, no more.
Stop! Stop! Stop!
Major!
Yes, Colonel?
Can we get this back on the rails?
The crane is in Paris by now.
Without a crane, impossible.
Nothing is impossible!
Get the men to work! I want this engine back on the rails!
If we had ten times as many men it couldn't be done.
I tell you it will! Do you hear me? I tell you it will!
It's hopeless, Colonel.
Unload those paintings!
All of you, unload them at once!
Go on, now, Schwarz.
- Get to work! Unload the crates! - Stop!
Come on, hurry up!
Stop!
Stop! Stop!
- Get your men off the trucks, Lieutenant. - We have orders...
Orders, I don't care about your orders. Do as I say!
Off the trucks!
Come on!
Off the trucks!
Move back! Move back!
Back in the trucks! Back in the trucks! What the hell's going on here?
I need your trucks, Major. I have an important cargo to deliver to Germany.
A French armoured division is over that hill. What about my men?
I don't care about your men! I order you to unload those trucks!
Save your orders, Colonel. In this sector the war is over.
- Back in the trucks! - I'll have you shot!
Back in the trucks!
Herren! Shoot that man!
He is to be executed for gross insubordination!
Unload the trucks!
Herren! I gave you an order!
We have lost, Colonel.
It's hopeless.
Look at those men.
A defeated army.
Lost, Herren?
Lost?
Yes.
Come on!
- You want transport? - Thank you.
- I have 50 men. - Tell them to move fast.
Schwarz! Bring the men on the double! We are moving out!
Grote, get the men in the trucks. We are moving out.
In the trucks!
Drop the paintings and get in the trucks!
Gunther!
Stop.
Colonel.
- You go on, Herren. - There is nothing to stay for, Colonel.
You're a good officer, Herren.
I'll be along in a few minutes.
There'll be other trucks.
Labiche!
Here's your prize, Labiche.
Some of the greatest paintings in the world.
Does it please you, Labiche?
Do you feel a sense of ex citement in just being near them?
A painting means as much to you as a string of pearls to an ape.
You won by sheer luck.
You stopped me without knowing what you were doing, or why.
You are nothing, Labiche.
A lump of flesh.
The paintings are mine.
They always will be.
Beauty belongs to the man who can appreciate it.
They will always belong to me or to a man like me.
Now, this minute,
you couldn't tell me why you did what you did.