Written by Old Bluffer 27th Oct 2009

Written by Kooshmeister

General Richter is the SS officer assigned to try and stop the Dirty Dozen from (what else?) killing several high-ranking Nazi officials. Needless to say his efforts for the most part are in vain as the Dozen, led by the somewhat geriatric Major Wright, seize control of the train carrying the officials.

They don't kill the officials (although they certainly lay waste to the soldiers aboard), requiring them as hostages. Richter suspects this, especially when the train doesn't stop and continues through Yugoslavia with the Grecian border as its ultimate destination, where Wright et al plan to rendezvous with a British submarine.

At the border, Richter sets up a roadblock of sorts consisting of three or four large trucks, some machine gun nests and various other nasty things (no tanks, as the movie didn't have the budget for them).

Initially, Richter seems like a reasonable enough fellow, telling his subordinates that he plans to negotiate with the Americans for the safe release of the hostages. He warns of dire consequences for whosoever dares to fire upon the train without his express orders.

Unfortunately, Wright doesn't stop. The train, pushing a large propane car, hurtles towards the blockage as the Americans bail out one by one (leaving the formerly captive Nazi officials on board to die apparently). Observing this, Richter suddenly transforms into a homicidal lunatic and orders everyone and everything to fire at the train and destroy it.

Richter himself draws his Luger and fires it. There's that old saying about a BB gun and a freight train that comes to mind...

However the moment the train smashes through the trucks, the propane tank explodes and most of the Germans run for the hills.

Wigging out something awful, Richter wastes what ammo is left in his sidearm shooting a few of his fleeing men in the back, before grabbing up a discarded machine gun. He then stands directly on the tracks, firing wildly, as the still-exploding pile of train and trucks shoots towards him. What, if anything, he thinks this will accomplish is left to our imaginations.

We don't actually see Richter struck by the train. Some confusing editing shows us a screaming Richter with superimposed flames, then we cut to the train smashing into and destroying the border checkpoint. Following the usual wrap-up of the plot with our surviving heroes however we cut back to the tracks where we're shown Richter's discarded hat, which the camera zooms in on dramatically.