Riding the Rails offers a visionary perspective on the presumed romanticism of the road and cautionary legacy of the Great Depression. The filmmakers relay the experiences and painful recollections of these now-elderly survivors of the rails. Forced to travel more by economic necessity than the spirit of adventure, the film's subjects dispel romantic myths of a hobo existence and its corresponding veneer of freedom. Riding the Rails recounts the hoboes' trade secrets for survival and accounts of dank miseries, loneliness, imprisonment, death, and dispossession. Sixty years later, the filmmakers transport their subjects back to the tracks, where the surging impact of sound and movement resuscitates memories of a shattered adolescence and devastating rite of passage.

Ernest Borgnine, star of the classic train movie Emperor of the North, hosts and narrates this remarkable examination of the uniquely American Hobo.

Just as the original hobos of the early 20th century were scorned the mainstream of society, so too are today's train riders. FREELOAD is a dive into a beggar's existence. It is a ride through America's backyard. It is a musical endeavor that feels like a drama. It is a sociological examination of the ignored.

John T. Davis stashes a camera in his bedroll, catches out, and rides the rails from Minneapolis to Seattle with Beargrease - a part-time hobo and full time philosopher, who narrates their way through the incredible scenery of the Northwest and gives us his views on life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. Along the way, the pair meet with several other men living life on the margins.

No description available.

A "scenic picture from a hobo's point of view".

Told in flashback, Depression-era bum Dan McGinty is recruited by the city's political machine to help with vote fraud. His great aptitude for this brings rapid promotion from "the boss," who finally decides he'd be ideal as a new, nominally "reform" mayor; but this candidacy requires marriage. His in-name-only marriage to honest Catherine proves the beginning of the end for dishonest Dan...

An alcoholic drifter spends Halloween in his hometown of Albany, New York after returning there for the first time in decades.

Hobos encounter a sadistic railway conductor that will not let anyone "ride the rails" for free.

A struggling band find themselves attached to a fugitive and drawn into a series of old feuds and love affairs, as they try to stay together and find musical success.

At the height of the Great Depression, Tommy's mother has been out of work for months when Eddie's father loses his job. Eager not to burden their parents, the two high school sophomores decide to hop the freight trains and look for work.

A vigilante homeless man pulls into a new city and finds himself trapped in urban chaos, a city where crime rules and where the city's crime boss reigns. Seeing an urban landscape filled with armed robbers, corrupt cops, abused prostitutes and even a pedophile Santa, the Hobo goes about bringing justice to the city the best way he knows how - with a 20-gauge shotgun. Mayhem ensues when he tries to make things better for the future generation. Street justice will indeed prevail.