Goofs

When the German officer throws his pipe down, it lands on a chair, spilling ashes onto the chair seat. The next time we see the pipe, there are no ashes.

Waldheim originally orders the train to depart on the morning of August 3, but in all later scenes everyone knows that daylight runs are much too dangerous due to the risk of bombing (which did not suddenly increase on that date).

(at around 35 mins) When Labiche starts to resolve the "problem" with switch 10, he bends down and reaches in with pliers in his hand. When he pulls out the obstruction (the German officer's pipe), there are no pliers in his hand.

In the switch tower, after the sirens sound, Labiche uses binoculars to watch Papa Boule engineering the train. In the next shot, the binoculars disappear.

In the bar, when Papa Boule approaches the counter to pay the bill, he leans the left hand on the counter. In the subsequent shot his left hand is by his side, with his thumb in his pocket.

When the German officer in the train thinks they've arrived in Germany, he takes a look at his map and we see Strasbourg (Alsace, France), the France-Germany border and Baaden-Baaden (Germany). During German occupation of France, Alsace and Strasbourg were annexed to the German Reich, i.e. this German military map should have shown a different border (100 km West) and Strasbourg should have been in Germany.

Gerd von Rundstedt was commanding the Germans in this movie, which took place in August 1944. In reality, von Rundstedt was fired in June for losing Normandy and wasn't reinstated until September, when Operation Market-Garden began.

Labiche shouts that "You can't get through" because the switch is set wrong, but it is a trailing switch (convergence), and hence would move under the weight of the train to the right position.

The cab of a moving steam locomotive is noisy, even when there aren't air raid sirens sounding. Papa Boule should never have been able to hear Labiche shouting at him from 50 feet away.

The station name on the roof in large letters, intended to aid aerial navigation in the pre-war years, would have been painted over in wartime.

After throwing the German guard off the train, Didont climbs over the coal compartment to release the train from the carriages. The back of the coal compartment has a sign saying danger in English. 'Danger' is the same in English as it is in French. (1h16m)

When Robert is shot and falls off the roof, look closely at his face. It's Burt Lancaster. Lancaster himself performed the stunt when he found out the regular stuntman would be unable to do it.

The first time we see the sign for the station "Rive-Rennes," it reads "Rive-Reine."

Although purportedly as French as anyone else in the movie (except the German soldiers), Labiche (Burt Lancaster) is the only character with a distinctly American accent.

When the armored locomotive is blown up during the air raid at Vaires, one of the drive wheels tumbles toward the camera. You can see that it is made out of wood.

When the bombing of the railway yard is about to start, we are shown a close up of Major Von Herren's watch when he is talking on the phone to Deitrich in the switch tower. The watch shows 10 o'clock, but the second hand is not moving, indicating the watch had not been wound.

Early in the movie in the railway yard, Didont sprays a group of German soldiers with steam from the train's engine yet none of the German soldiers scream out in pain. Water becomes steam at 100 degrees Celsius (212 degrees Fahrenheit) but steam trains put steam under pressure which causes the temperature of steam to rise many hundreds of degrees which would cause massive injuries to the soldiers but they seem to be only mildly inconvenienced by the high temperature steam from the engine.

Whilst some of the German riflemen have ammunition pouches on their belts, not a single one of the soldiers armed with MP40 sub-machine guns has any magazine pouches.

When the armored German locomotive is moving into position in Vaires to haul the armaments train, several 1960 era automobiles can be seen in the far background parked on a street.

In the marshalling yard at Vaires, in the final shot of the armoured train being moved forward, before it stops and then starts to reverse back, several post-war cars can clearly be seen in the car park of the building behind the railway lines.

Just after the scene of the Verdun station track layout the camera pans a room with a French calendar on the wall for Corona, a French paint. The three months pictured have 31 days, starts on a Monday, 31 days, starts on a Thursday, and 30 days, starts on a Sunday (obviously July, August and September). Although the calendar shows a barely legible "1944" on the paintbrush handle, this calendar is likely from 1963, the year the scene was filmed in France.

During the yards bombing scene, several SNCF class 141R steam engines are visible. These engines were manufactured in USA and Canada and were only delivered after the end of World War II.

When the rail yard at Vaires is being bombed, the whistle of bombs is heard, but none are seen falling before the explosions are seen on the ground. Bombs are almost always visible while falling before they hit.

When Labiche and his men are discovered painting white on the tops of the train cars carrying the stolen art, a German soldier runs at them firing his machine gun. The muzzle flashes, but there are no matching machine gun sounds; only a few single shots and some yelling and the siren are heard.

As Pesquet moves the armored locomotive out of the engine shed, the hissing sound of steam blowing from the cylinder drain cocks can be heard, but no steam can be seen coming from the cocks.

When LaBische hits Schwartz with the shovel and he and Didont throw him off the train, when he lands, the padding covered with grass, bounces.

When the Nazi is hit with the coal shovel and thrown from the train, he lands on a buried landing pad. The ground moves for a distance around him, in the shape of a rectangle. Leaves and dust fly up in the air showing the outline of a rectangular landing pad buried under a layer of ground debris. Even a nearby bush shakes as though the landing pad is tied to it.

A camera shadow is seen on the ground and on Labiche's back as he climbs over the hill and through some trees as he continues to try to sabotage the rail line.

When Paul Scofield has loaded the art train and is called to the hut for a telephone call, the boom microphone is briefly visible at the top of the frame right when he says the words "Von Waldeim Speaking".

During the bombing raid on the rail yard, the art train and the German arms train are shown headed in the same direction. The arms train should've been headed west to the front and the art train moving east to Germany.

When the art train is rerouted in the wrong direction to return to Paris, instead of going to Germany, the soldiers on the train should have noticed the deception when they saw the sun rising behind them, instead of in front of them in the morning. They were supposed to be traveling East, but were in fact traveling West.

Corporal Dietrich is wearing an officers uniform with the rank of captain.

All French characters speak English to each other instead of French, and all German characters speak English to each other instead of German.