The First Great Train Robbery

The First Great Train Robbery (1978) — watch online a sharp Victorian heist film on iFILM, written and directed by Michael Crichton from his own novel. Sean Connery plays Edward Pierce, a well-dressed London gentleman with a scheme: lift £25,000 in gold bullion from an armoured railway car heading to fund the Crimean War.

Getting to the gold requires wax impressions of four separate keys, each held by a different person with no reason to cooperate. Pierce, his safecracker partner Agar (Donald Sutherland), and the resourceful Miriam (Leslie-Anne Down) build a layered con where every piece has to fall into place in the right order. Crichton shot the climactic chase on a real moving steam train — Connery did much of the rooftop work himself, which adds a jittery physicality the studio backlots of that era rarely produced.

Elegant, unhurried, and funny in the right moments — this is the kind of heist picture where the pleasure is entirely in watching the mechanism tick. Stream The First Great Train Robbery (1978) online on iFILM.