The Passage

“An ice-swept escape route in front of them. A cold-blooded killer behind them. The only way out is up.”

A Basque shepherd (Anthony Quinn) is approached by the French underground during the Second World War and asked to lead a scientist and his family over the Pyrenees. Professor Bergson (James Mason) travels with his wife and daughter, while Capt. Von Berkow (Malcolm McDowell), a German officer, hunts them across the mountains. J. Lee Thompson keeps the climb on the screen, the Basque ahead on the rock, the family strung out behind him on the slope.