Sean Connery plays Edward Pierce, the mastermind, in The Great Train Robbery (1978), also known as The First Great Train Robbery.
Pierce organizes a theft of gold being transported by train during the 1850s. He recruits accomplices and arranges a sequence of deceptions, stolen keys, and coordinated actions to reach the valuables. The character is portrayed as an elegant criminal who combines social access with practical planning.
The film was written and directed by Michael Crichton and adapted from his 1975 novel The Great Train Robbery. Crichton drew on the Victorian-era 1855 robbery of a gold shipment on the London, Brighton and South Coast Railway, but the movie dramatizes and reshapes the historical material.
The title can cause confusion because Edwin S. Porter’s 1903 silent short film is also called The Great Train Robbery. Connery’s film is the 1978 feature adaptation of Crichton’s novel, and its cast also includes Donald Sutherland, Lesley-Anne Down, and Alan Webb.