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The Cassandra Crossing (1976)

Rate: 6
Viewed: 9/23

CassC
9/23: I don't understand a lot of things that have happened in The Cassandra Crossing.

Did the soldiers know they were being sacrificed on purpose? If true, then I'm surprised that they're willing to go ahead with it. It'll be curious to find out how they can eat, drink, or go to the bathroom while guarding the passengers inside the train because at some point the biohazard suit will have to be taken off. By the way, why not slow down the train? What's the rush here?

Why did Robby say there were soldiers atop the train? I'm only asking this because I didn't see anybody there at all. It's a hell of a lot easier to move toward the front from the top than by the side. When Robby was shot dead, why would the metal sheet show slits when its purpose was to contain the smell of the plague completely? By the way, he's a mountain climber who happens to be a heroin addict? It's not possible.

I fail to comprehend why the United States Army is taking over the outbreak situation that occurs in Europe. What justifies their authority? Also, why announce to everybody on the train that there's a bomb threat when something more innocuous like debris on the tracks will do?

Why are the soldiers shooting at the train passengers? Are they supposed to be helping them out? At the end of the film, there's a lot of gunfire, but why are several passengers getting up and walking in the middle of the hallway? Don't they know what the hell is going on? After the train crashed, I was surprised to see plenty of never-seen-before, nonchalant passengers in the front. Everybody keeps saying there are 1,000 aboard, but the feel has been consistently thirty or so.

What Dr. Chamberlain proposed makes sense when he said the infected should be moved to one end of the train while the healthy go to the opposite end. That way, if there are no signs for a week or two, they're deemed safe and therefore allowed to enter the next phase while the rest will stay put for additional quarantine. But noooo....Colonel MacKenzie, by the order of his superior(s), says, "Kill them all, no exceptions." Pretty extreme, I must say. Imagine the avalanche of lawsuits.

Meanwhile, it's an interesting collection of all-stars: Richard Harris, Sophia Loren, Burt Lancaster, Ava Gardner, Martin Sheen, Lee Strasberg, and O.J. Simpson. Richard Harris has done better in a different disaster picture called Juggernaut while Sophia Loren gives more effort than usual. The rest of the cast is okay although Lee Strasberg may have overacted a bit. On why she took the role, Ava Gardner said, "The real reason I'm in this picture is money, baby, pure and simple." Okay, thank you very much...Miss Gardner. Ann Turkel, who sang one song, was Richard Harris' ex-wife.

All in all, The Cassandra Crossing is a good remake candidate given the multitude of head-scratching logic flaws.