Mark Robson · 1965 · rail

Mark Robson's 1965 war film. An American colonel takes charge of a prisoner-of-war camp in Italy and is loathed by the British inmates for his collaboration - until the Italian armistice, when the whole camp is loaded onto a train for Germany. Ryan hijacks it, and runs it north through Rome and Milan for the Swiss frontier with the Luftwaffe overhead.

1. 1
   Rome

   After the Italian armistice, the prisoners are recaptured and packed into cattle wagons for the journey to Germany - and Colonel Ryan, despised by his own men as Von Ryan for his dealings with the Italians, takes the train instead.

2. 2
   Florence

   Disguising themselves as German guards, the prisoners bluff the train north through checkpoints and marshalling yards, holding their nerve at every stop while an Italian priest does the talking in German for them.

3. 3
   Milan

   At Milan the train has to be switched off the Brenner line and onto the Swiss route in the middle of a working yard - the point at which the deception stops being sustainable and the Germans finally understand what has happened.

4. 4
   Como

   Running north past Como with fighters strafing the carriages and a German troop train behind them, the prisoners fight from the roofs and the trackside, buying yards of line at a time.

5. 5
   Chiasso

   The frontier at last, with Switzerland on the other side of a few hundred metres of rail - and Ryan, running behind the train he saved, does not quite reach it.