Shining Time Station: The Movie

Shining Time Station: The Movie is a 2005 live-action/animated feature film directed by Robert Zemeckis, and produced by Britt Allcroft, who had directed Thomas and the Magic Railroad (2000) without Zemeckis. The film stars Eddie Glen (who voiced Thomas in TATMR) as a longtime railroad conductor on the Island of Sodor. He is met by the conductors of Shining Time Station (played by Ringo Starr, George Carlin, Alec Baldwin and Michael Brandon) to assist in a problem Thomas and the Steam Team were overcoming. The film was released by Universal Pictures and received generally positive reviews from critics, who named it a "makeover" of Thomas and the Magic Railroad. It was released on September 30th, 2005 and grossed $13,456,227 at the box office. A sequel was planning to be released in 2008, but was cancelled due to unknown reasons.

Plot
In 1893 England, a special railroad named the Island of Sodor has finished construction, linking to Tidmouth Sheds a couple miles away. Two women named Annie and Clarabel died during construction and are buried at the first dock, named Shining Time Station, nicknamed by the narrator as a "magical place just for you". The narrator, revealed to be a dying former railroad conductor named Douglas 110 years later, says his final words before dying: "I wish I was there again".

At Shining Time in 2003, the Steam Team (Thomas, James, Percy, Gordon, Edward, Emily, Henry and Toby) receive their gifts from Mr. Conductor, Mr. Conductor II, Mr. Conductor III and Mr. Conductor Jr. on the annual "Present Day". Thomas, after getting his gift, thinks about the times when Douglas was younger.