TeenzTen An action-packed slog

Logan Dodd There is definitely an excellent idea hidden in the background of the film. Unfortunately, it's difficult to find it.

Guillelmina The film's masterful storytelling did its job. The message was clear. No need to overdo.

Billy Ollie Through painfully honest and emotional moments, the movie becomes irresistibly relatable

lorraineesimpson I'm a sucker for a train film and this one has a decent cast so thought I would give it a try. The storyline is basically good, although at times I felt if it had just taken a slightly different turn it could have been so much better. I'm not normally a fan of Woody Harrelson but he played his part well, Ben Kingsley is a fine actor who is always worth watching, Kate Mara and Eduardo Noriega were also convincing. However, Emily Mortimer seemed to be working with the objective of making Jessie possibly one of the most annoying female characters ever to appear in a film. To be fair she can't be blamed for the script which dictated some of her character's more implausible actions, but her quivering, breathless, permanently agitated performance became more and more exasperating as the film progressed. I seriously wanted to push her right off that train! She is normally a good actress but I thought she was horrible in this role, turning what could have been an interesting character into an irritating airhead. If you can overlook the emotional excess of Jessie, and also the fairly patronising, stereotypical portrayal of Russian people, this is a decent enough film. It's watchable and its rating on IMDb is probably about right (currently 6.7). Could have been better but could also have been worse.

NateWatchesCoolMovies I love movies set on trains. And I loove movies set in the snow. Imagine my excitement when I heard there'd be a movie set on the longest train ride in the world, in one of the largest snowy region in the world. And it didn't disappoint. Transsiberian could have easily descended into action thriller clichés and been a letdown, but every character is well written, the story has bite and depth to it, and although it's a nasty, cold hearted affair, it's not without its sympathies. Woody Harrelson and Emily Mortimer play a vacationing American couple on the transsiberian railway. Harrelson is a naive city bumpkin and plays the role well.. Mortimer is phenomenal, at first seeming like a terrified waif, until we learn bit by bit that she has a few sinister secrets, and is taking a dangerous risk and hiding things from her husband. They meet another couple, played by Kate Mara and Eduardo Noriega, and strike a tenuous, suspenseful bond that leads to violent confrontations and secrets being spilled like blood flying into the snow. Kate Mara is brilliant,striking the perfect balance between edgy and unassuming as an outsider girl who is looking for a way out. Ben Kingsley and Thomas Kretschmann show up as shady Russian narcotics agents, trawling the trains compartments in search of drug smugglers. Kingsley steals the movie with the monstrous characters he creates. This is a ruthless, nasty cop that you just don't want to get in the path of. The film is shot in gorgeous, sweeping white and grey brush strokes, visualizing a desolation and quiet sense of impending danger personified by the vast, cold mountainous landscape. It may not be a perfect film and it falters occasionally, but it's an immensely entertaining genre effort brought to life by its committed actors, it's frank, uncompromising narrative and gorgeous locations that are ever changing as the train meanders through the frozen dreamland of snow, wind and looming, beautiful mountains.

James Hitchcock "Transsiberian" can be described as a train thriller for the twenty- first century. Train thrillers were once quite popular; several of Alfred Hitchcock's films, for example, include significant scenes set on a train, including "The Lady Vanishes", "Shadow of a Doubt", "Strangers on a Train" and "North by North-West". The sub-genre, however, declined in the latter part of the twentieth century as aircraft began to replace trains as the preferred medium for long-distance travel in America and most other parts of the world. The film is officially described as a Spanish-German-British-Lithuanian co-production, and is probably the only example of a Spanish-German- British-Lithuanian co-production I have ever seen. Indeed, it is probably the only example of a Spanish-German-British-Lithuanian co- production anyone has ever seen. In the modern age, however, even multi- national European co-productions need to work for the Yankee dollar, so "Transsiberian" was directed by an American, Brad Anderson, and revolves around the adventures of an American couple abroad. The couple in question, Roy and Jessie, have been working in China as part of a Christian mission, and because Roy is something of a train buff decide to return home via Moscow on the Trans-Siberian Railway. (That would be the normal spelling in English, even if the makers of this film prefer the bizarre "Transsiberian"). On the journey they befriend another American woman, Abby, and her Spanish boyfriend Carlos. About the first half-hour of the film is taken up with little more than small-talk between the two couples and we wonder when the thrills are going to start. And then, of course, they do. Roy mysteriously goes missing from the train and it looks as if we are in for an unacknowledged remake of "The Lady Vanishes", but a few minutes later we learn there is a rational, and perfectly banal, explanation for his disappearance; he missed the train in while sightseeing in Irkutsk, will catch the next train, and all Jessie needs to do is to wait at the next stop until they are reunited. And so the film sets off on its own roller-coaster journey in the course of which it repeatedly turns from one type of thriller into another. From a "missing person" thriller it becomes a "girl in peril from a charming but sinister stranger" thriller, and then a "woman wrongly suspected of murder" thriller, and then a "some-other-type-of-thriller", and then a .......well, you get the general idea. This sudden, continuous switching from one storyline to another means that the film never has a chance to arouse much interest; as soon as we have got interested in one scenario, it place is quickly usurped by another. The other thing I disliked about the film was the way it, despite being a Spanish-German-British-Lithuanian co-production, pandered to American paranoia about Abroad, especially about Russia and Eastern Europe, a paranoia which has been all to obvious in a number of recent Hollywood movies. Roy and Jessie are the quintessential innocents abroad, good Godfearing American folks who blunder into a nightmare when they travel to foreign parts with the best of motives. The Cold War may be over, but Russia is still a dangerous, hostile place for innocent Americans, a land of gangsterism and corrupt officialdom which may just be two sides of the same counterfeit coin. Even Western Europeans are not necessarily to be trusted; Roy and Jessie discover to their cost that their Spanish fellow traveller Carlos may be as big a threat to them as any Russian. .Probably the best acting performances come from Ben Kingsley as a Russian detective and Eduardo Noriega as the handsome and charismatic but sinister Carlos. Woody Harrelson and Emily Mortimer are both a bit anonymous, but I wondered if this was a deliberate attempt to emphasis Roy and Jessie's "Mr and Mrs Average" credentials. The characterisation of Roy may owe something to the common British preconception that trainspotters are all anorak-clad nerds who desperately need to get a life. There is some attractive, atmospheric photography of the snowbound Russian landscapes, but overall "Transsiberian" is a film which does not really hang together and relies too heavily on xenophobic fears. If it was an attempt to emulate Hitchcock's train thrillers, it falls a long way short of the Master's work. 4/10

Ben Larson It is good to see that Hitchcock is alive and well. Brad Anderson (Session 9) gives us a good thriller that keeps us guessing throughout.You never know who the good guys and the bad guys are. It really doesn't matter as the characters are so good that you are drawn to their performances.Emily Mortimer (Paris, je t'aime, The Sleeping Dictionary) is excellent as a tempted wife who finds that demons still exist within her. When she realizes that she has been set up, the tension became amazing as we watch her efforts to escape.The tempter is an equally good Eduardo Noriega (Vantage point & the elusive Alatriste). He has met his match with Mortimer, but not before he really complicates her life.There is some really gruesome torture involving Kate Mara (Brokeback Mountain, We Are Marshall).And, there is Ben Kingsley, a detective that goes after drug dealers. His performance is amazing. (Kingsley will be in Queen of the South next year, but I don't get my hopes up as that film is written by the same person who wrote Alatriste, which is not to be found.) Kingsley is his usual amazing self and his character is worth the price of admission all by itself.