NM on Film

THE CUMBRES & TOLTEC SCENIC RAILROAD

- Bonanza Creek Ranch
- Cook Ranch and the Silverado Set
- The Cumbres & Toltec Scenic Railroad
- Eaves Movie Ranch
- White Sands National Monument
- Zia Pueblo
A 1915 circus train maneuvers through verdant high country, carrying the usual cargo of tents and exotic animals, and to the delight of Indiana Jones fans, the teen-aged Indy played by River Phoenix. In a few short minutes of rapid, punching shots - delivered in the style of George Lucas and Steven Spielberg - we discover that the grown Indy we all knew was once a kid with a brash curiosity, an explorer's ambition and, of course, fearlessness in the face of grave danger inspired by that untempered curiosity. We also learn why, when young Indy falls into a box car of slithering snakes, his famous courage all but disappears.

The train of choice for these scenes is the Cumbres & Toltec Scenic Railroad headquartered in Chama. It's easy to see why a large-scale production using so many different locations would locate its 100-plus crew in Chama for two weeks of filming, albeit during the l988 Yellowstone fire when the smoke and haze drifted all the way down to the Cumbres Pass. Any one of the railroad's six steam-powered locomotives makes for an instant romantic screen presence, with the great power, beauty and determined grace that is touted by such engines. Then there's the terrain forming the backdrop - the 10,000-foot Cumbres Pass of alpine conifers and aspens, mountain streams and spreading meadows that gradually transform into open prairie land on the Colorado side of the tracks. This versatility, along with the magic of movie set dressing, has enabled production companies to shoot l870s Westerns up to present-day stories meant to take place in Texas or Mexico or other parts of the country.

"Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade remodeled the engine to look turn of the century rather than 1870s," said Earl Knoob, superintendent of operations for the C&TS RR. "They painted it to look like a locomotive that would've pulled a circus train of the era." Extensive modifications of some box cars were also done for the project. Knoob recalls a scene where a rhinoceros horn comes through the roof, so the company carefully removed the tin and underlying boards and replaced them with painted balsa wood to do the shot. The original materials were then put back on. Another scene involved a boxcar that had a mechanical giraffe head operated with handlebars from below. "When they do stuff like that we have to make sure that what they're going to do is not going to adversely affect the historic integrity," Knoob said.

The C&TS RR has national historic site status, which means that no structural changes or improvements to the depot can be made without approval from the State Historic Preservation Office. Some structural improvements are needed, according to Knoob, to accommodate the dramatic change in the scope of operations that the railroad has undergone - from 10 passengers a day in the early years up to 641 passengers at present.

The railroad was built in 1880 by the Denver & Río Grande Railway, to a gauge of 3 feet between the rails (so-called "narrow gauge"). The Río Grande and successive companies operated the line as a freight and passenger railroad until 1968. At that time a grassroots effort was formed between the states of Colorado and New Mexico to preserve the railroad. This led to the creation of a bi-state authority that eventually drafted federal legislation to purchase the railroad. Then in 1970, New Mexico and Colorado became joint owners of the 64 miles of track between Chama and Antonito, for a purchase price of about a half-million dollars. The bi-state commission overseeing the railroad leases it out to a private company for its operation.

The historic integrity of the depot was a windfall for the producers of Wyatt Earp during its brief filming there in the summer of 1993. The company built a small depot set on the prairie side of the tracks, while night filming took place at the main depot in Chama. Knoob says the filming was done with military precision. "When they told me what they wanted to do, and how many scenes they wanted for Wyatt Earp, I thought, 'They're not going to be able to do this in four days.' But they did. They managed to get everything on time, or even before." Knoob has great admiration for the directing styles of Larry Kasdan and Steven Spielberg.

"Obviously those guys are where they are in this industry because they're really good at it. They know how to get what they want and they know how to do it most efficiently," he said.

Another director Knoob singles out is Burt Kennedy, who used the train in 1968 for The Good Guys and the Bad Guys and returned in 1988 to direct Where the Hell's That Gold?!!? in which Willie Nelson plays a desperado on a Mexican Army train. "There was this different mentality of the old style of making movies," Knoob says of Kennedy. "(Director) John Ford probably did it the same way, very non-technical - 'everything's in my head, this is the way I'm going to do it.' "

Whatever the director's style or scope of the project, Knoob and the staff at the Cumbres & Toltec Scenic Railroad are clearly eager for more. He says with a smile, "It's a business that we really like."