I just saw this thing for the first time last week. One must realize that art imitates life, but only to a point. I must say that I recognized
most of the lingo. It is kinda like talking to the railbuffs who try to "talk the talk", but one recognizes who's real and who's not. A railroader just knows!
Ya gots to accept that Hollywood feels it necessary to put in a bit more tension, more blood and gore in most any film, or they think the public won't buy it. I, too, questioned some of the things they did, but wrote it off to making the movie more exciting. If the guy had walked across the "porch" onto the runaway engine, the movie would've ended right there! They needed 2 hours to stretch the story.
It's good to see a generally accurate railroad story, but we all know that, most of the time, the railroad life is boring and uneventful. Now if you count the time a bum walked into our shop office and snatched a clerk's pocketbook right off her desk, and the truckdriver/porter took off in hot pursuit in our Chevy crew truck after the raggedy old Nova............................................
GF