Tag Archives: Durango & Silverton

Railroad Tigers 2016

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Well Go USA Entertainment

Happy Birthday, Hunny! Yep, this movie review coincides approximately with my wife’s 39th birthday and references tigers, her favorite carnivore and house pet.

The movie itself is rather thin on the tiger side, but chock full of kick railroad scenes pretty much throughout this picture. I had a heck of a time finding out about the locomotives used. After much googling, I came across this vague quote from Wiki: “The film had railway sequences shot in Diaobingshan using steam trains.”

Diaobingshan was the key. I soon discovered the nearby Tiefa Steam Locomotive Museum which has a whole fleet of similar looking locomotives. <– This last link is an absolutely outstanding look at operations from over 20 years ago (Many thanks to David Longman).

One more lick of trivia before we start reviewing. Check out the above back cover from my DVD. How did a U.S. built (Baldwin 1925), narrow gauge, Durango & Silverton K-36 class 2-8-2 #486, make it all the way to Diaobingshan? Slow boat to China? Nope. Cut & paste, and maybe they won’t notice. How about Flying Tigers?

Ding Hao!!

Here’s a REAL railroad tiger, posing with my glass-marbled crossbuck. Mister Tiger is the aforementioned house pet who spends most of his time napping on the living room couch (Lazy ass tiger…).

SY class 2-8-2 #9708 rounds a curve with an eclectic mix of rolling stock. I believe filmmakers were using 2 locomotives and just changing their numbers for different scenes or trains.

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Cole Younger and the Black Train 2012

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Forbesfilm

Dreadful. That’s how one IMDb.com reviewer described this 2.5 stars out of 10 stinkeroo. This is undoubtedly the WORST obscure train movie I’ve ever watched, bar none. The cinematography is out-of-focus or ridiculously close-up and the acting is wooden. I only reviewed this movie because it promised 3 former Denver & Rio Grande Western narrow gauge locomotives in shot.

As compensation, dear reader, I will offer clear, nicely-framed pictures and details of the three locomotives and rolling stock. All train scenes were filmed along the Durango & Silverton tourist railroad in Colorado. Since the film is so wretched, I will not bother to I.D. any of the principals involved. As a group, they need a refresher course in filmmaking.

How I suffer for my hobby. OK, Let’s go train spotting!!

Well, there’s ONE guy I WILL identify. I gave this mug the pet name of “Dude”. It helped me get through the movie. Here we see Dude shuffling alongside D&S #486. More about the locomotive later.

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A Ticket to Tomahawk 1950

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20th Century Fox

I actually reviewed Tomahawk back in the early days of Obscure Train Movies — It just wasn’t much of a review. Today, I hope to do a better job revisiting A Ticket To Tomahawk in all its Technicolor glory. This is the movie that put the Durango and Silverton D&RGW narrow gauge line on the map. Not only did people come to ride the little train in Southwestern Colorado, moviemakers returned to film other pictures too numerous to list here.

The star of the show is Rio Grande Southern #20, 4-6-0 3-foot narrow gauge steam locomotive. #20 was originally built for the Florence and Cripple Creek Railroad in 1899 by Schenectady Locomotive Works (Alco). For its movie appearance, RGS #20 was decorated in a colorful paint scheme and named “Emma Sweeny” as Tomahawk & Western Railroad #1.

Just look at all that detail! Red and gold paint accentuates the green Emma Sweeny signboard. Antlers on the headlight box and white “extra train” flags flapping in the breeze. In another view, Emma poses in good light near Silverton.

Apologies for the fuzzy screen caps. AFAIK, Fox never released Tomahawk on DVD, so I had to make do with an aftermarket product.

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