Silver Streak (film) - Plot

Plot

Book editor George Caldwell (Wilder) travels from Los Angeles to Chicago for his sister's wedding aboard a train called the Silver Streak. On board, George meets a vitamin salesman named Bob Sweet (Beatty) and a woman named Hilly Burns (Clayburgh). Hilly works for Professor Schreiner, a well-known art historian who is on a publicity tour for his new book on Rembrandt. After dinner, George and Hilly go to her room for a night of romance.

Suddenly George sees a dead body dangling momentarily from the roof of the train outside the window and then falling away. But he is drunk and Hilly insists he must have imagined it. But in the morning, he sees her copy of Schreiner's book, with the author's photo: he was the dead man. There is an envelope in the book.

Schreiner's killers are Johnson (Stefan Gierasch), who resembles him; Whiney (Ray Walston); and Reace (Richard Kiel). George goes to Schreiner's room, and Reace throws him off the train. George finds a farmer (Lucille Benson) and they overtake the train in her de Havilland Tiger Moth biplane.

Back aboard, George sees Johnson (impersonating Schreiner), Hilly (supporting his act under duress), Whiney, and art dealer Devereau (McGoohan). Devereau apologizes to George for the "misunderstanding" involving Reace. After mentioning "the Rembrandt letters", Johnson says he will return to his room for a glass of scotch.

Embarrassed, George goes to the club car and begins drinking heavily, confiding in Sweet about his misadventure. Sweet reveals himself as an undercover federal agent named Stevens. He confirms George's suspicions: the real Schreiner did not drink alcohol. Devereau, a wanted criminal, is the mastermind. His plan is to have Johnson, disguised as Schreiner, discredit Schreiner's book that exposes Devereau for authenticating two forgeries as original Rembrandts.

They find the envelope George saw. It contains letters written by Rembrandt himself, proving Devereau's guilt. But then Reace kills Stevens and goes after George. Their fight ends on the roof, where George kills Reace with a speargun but is knocked to the ground by an overhanging signal.

On foot again, George finds the local sheriff (Clifton James), but is accused of murdering Stevens. He escapes, stealing a patrol car — which was transporting small-time thief Grover T. Muldoon (Pryor). George and Grover work together to reach the train at Kansas City. Grover disguises George as a flamboyant black man and he gets by police and reboards.

George is captured, but he and Hilly are both rescued from Devereau's room by Grover, disguised as a steward. After a shootout, George and Grover jump off the train and are arrested and taken to a small abandoned train station, where federal agent Donaldson (Len Birman) explains that he planted the Stevens murder story to protect George. George tells Donaldson about Devereau's plan, and Donaldson arranges for the train to be stopped and raided by his men. Meanwhile, Devereau burns the Rembrandt letters.

Once the train has stopped and the other passengers are off, another shootout ensues. George boards the train a fourth time, with Grover, as Devereau climbs onto the locomotive and orders the engineer to start moving. An agent shoots Whiney, George shoots Johnson, and Devereau shoots the engineer and places a toolbox on the dead man's brake pedal. Devereau is then shot by Donaldson, falls part way out of the locomotive cab, and is decapitated by another train.

Devereau and his men are gone, but with no one alive on the locomotive and the pedal depressed, the train is running away. Devereau's men had also disabled the emergency brakes in each car. With the help of a steward, George uncouples the passenger cars from the engine. The engine roars into the station, smashes through the end-of-track barrier, and thunders into the terminal, destroying everything in its path as bystanders flee; the passenger cars come to a gentle stop behind it. Grover steals a sports car that was on display in the station and drives away, and George and Hilly kiss and begin their relationship anew.