Customer Reviews

The Midnight Meat Train [Blu-ray]

5 star:		(31)
4 star:		(31)
3 star:		(12)
2 star:		(16)
1 star:		(10)

 

 

Clive Barker adaptations being good are a dime a dozen, which is why I didn't look too forward to The Midnight Meat Train, especially after Lion's Gate quietly dumped it into discount theaters before disappearing and recently premiering on FearNet. Upon viewing however, The Midnight Meat Train proves to be surprisingly good, and is definitely the best Barker adaptation since Barker adapted his own work with the original Hellraiser. Bradley Cooper stars as Leon, an up and coming photographer who inadvertantly ends up discovering a murderer dubbed Mahogany (Vinnie Jones) that travels via subway, and slaughters his victims like cattle. As Leon learns more, his following of Mahogany becomes an obsession that is slowly changing him, and frightening his suffering girlfriend (Iron Man's Leslie Bibb). This all eventually leads to a bloody showdown, and an ending that is simply dynamite. The performances are solid (Jones is actually surprisingly scary) and the gore is aplenty, and the overall tone of the film retains the spirit of many of Barker's best works. The only real flaws with The Midnight Meat Train lie within some of the gore effects. A number of them suffer from the fact that they are obviously CGI-based, meaning sometimes they just look laughably fake. Besides this however, The Midnight Meat Train is a surprisingly good and frightening ride that will definitely hold your interest, and is a film that deserved a better fate than what Lion's Gate gave it, and will hopefully find a deserved following now that it's making its way to DVD.

"Life is just a murdertrain a-comin'." -Dethklok

Japanese cult cinema prodigy Ryuhei Kitamura has done it again. But this time he has taken his anarchic genius and tossed us Westerners a bone by directing this American film based on a short story by Clive Barker. The result is spectacular at times and entertaining throughout. Kitamura is best known for his B-classic Versus and best loved by me for his modern samurai masterpiece Azumi. He has never made a bad film and remains a director whose latest works I anticipate with baited breath. In the past, the biggest problems with his films have been budget-related, though he proved he can make a decent flick with only two real cast members in a single room with almost no special effects in Aragami: The Raging God of Battle. Well, with a modest (but large for him) American budget and a damn fine cast including Brooke Shields and Vinnie Jones (he's STILL the Juggernaut, b!+ch!), Kitamura has staked his claim in Western horror and I like what I see. A lot. In fact, there are shades of The Texas Chainsaw Massacre throughout. This may never be quite the classic that one is, but it is almost guaranteed to gather a cult following of its own.

Our protagonist is Leon, a photographer on the verge of success with a beautiful girlfriend. One night he happens upon a dizzying beauty being assailed by a group of thugs in the subway. After bravely confronting the gang and using his head to escape harm while getting some outstandingly menacing photos in the process, he watches the girl get onto the late night train. She is never seen again. The girl turns out to be a popular model, and when her disappearance is noted by the paper, Leon becomes obsessed with the case. Turns out folks have been disappearing along that route since at least the 1800's. What follows is a riveting mystery with plenty of violence, a classic villain, and a twist that is genius even if the foreshadowing for it comes on too strong and gives it away.

Vinnie Jones is intimidating in his no-lines performance as Mahogany, the towering meathead of a butcher who rides the late train and cleans house before the last stop with a disturbingly shiny hammer in one hand and a meathook in the other. His carnage is something to behold and Kitamura's unparalleled eye for jaw-dropping shots that astound with their creativity and downright coolness is put to use on several occasions. One victim's head goes flying after taking a particularly brutal hammer blow and it is shot entirely with what I'm going to call a decapi-cam. This is my shot of the year. The other contenders are also from this film. The climactic battle aboard the train could have been another typical bad-guy-vs-good-guy slugfest, but Kitamura has the camera swooping 360 degrees around the train as we view the fight through the windows and it comes to a stop just as the combatants bust through the glass right in front of it. This is the kind of creativity American filmmakers are lacking these days. There's another fight early on where what has to be the most militant-looking black man I've ever seen steps aboard and mocks Mahogany with a gut-busting quote from Forrest Gump that had me afraid I was going to wake up my wife across the house. "Midnight Meat Train" may have a corny-sounding name, but it delivers the goods big-time. There's less nudity than I would have liked considering what a sexpot Leon's woman is, but I'll trade some brief nude shots for hammer decapitations any day.

Aside from some obvious filler, a few cutaway shots when I was screaming for more gore, and the excessive foreshadowing -which starts pretty early as genius but begins pounding you in the face as the film approaches critical mass- there is little not to love about this film if you are a horror fanatic. Craven, Carpenter, Romero, and the other horror directors have got to be shaking in their boots right now because Kitamura is coming on strong with this film. It's an absolute disgrace that this didn't get a wide theatrical release when so much garbage and so many remakes by so many hacks get millions spent on promotion and become big successes even if you can't find a single person who will admit to enjoying them. Here's an excerpt from an article that illustrates my point:

"Clive Barker was angry with the LionsGate's treatment, believing that Lionsgate president Joe Drake is essentially shortchanging other people's films in order to focus more attention on movies like The Strangers, where he received a producing credit: "The politics that are being visited upon it have nothing to do with the movie at all. This is all about ego, and though I mourn the fact that `Midnight Meat Train' was never given its chance in theaters, it's a beautifully stylish, scary movie, and it isn't going anywhere. People will find it, and whether they find it in midnight shows or they find it on DVD, they'll find it, and in the end the Joe Drakes of the world will disappear."

Amen.

"Midnight Meat Train" is the kind of original horror that I crave. I've been critical of Clive Barker in the past as his name plastered across a product often indicates mediocrity, but this film shut my mouth good and proper. Horror fans owe it to themselves to give this one a chance.

4 1/2 stars rounded up for a bleak ending that somehow made me feel elated.

Whoever decided to choose the ridiculous release technique is a moron. Films like Saw 5 and Quarantine get big releases while this is released into cheap theatres and then on Commercial Cable TV and then video. Very sad.

I just watched The Midnight Meat Train and I must say it's a great horror movie. It's certainly a fun ride that is gruesome, brutal, and hard to watch. It has beautiful visuals, and the gore is eye pleasing! The acting is great (Especially Jones, he freaked me out), and is a breath of fresh air. So I'll try something different with my review here:

1. Yes the title is pretty cheesy, but it didn't distract me from the movie at all. It does indeed sound like the name of a porno. But looking past the cheesy title, it actually relates to the events in the movie.

2. It does stay faithful to the short story, and is the best CB adaptation.

3. Vinnie Jones is the bomb in this. He IS Mahogany. He really just pours himself into the role here. No effort required- he even looks like the last guy you'd wanna run into.

4. This movie is VERY gory. I was actually squirming in a few scenes, but in other places the gore was obviously CGI, but that didn't detract from the movie. I'm a gore hound and I even cringed at a few bits.

5. Ted Raimi makes a short cameo in this.

6. This film takes a VERY unexpected twist at the end. I, for one, was completely gob-smacked and did NOT see it coming. It was a well-done twist that you'll be shocked by when you see it.

7. The only thing I disliked is that at 100 minutes it actually felt longer, perhaps more like 2 hours and 15 minutes. I thought the fight scene on the train was the ending, but nope, I was wrong.

8. It has an excellent one-liner: "Please, step away from the meat."

9. And did I mention I totally did NOT see that twist at the end?

Anyways this is an excellent movie, and one of the best horror/thriller movies Ive seen. It's gruesome, brutal stuff that's hard to watch. And you will totally be shocked and surprised, so if you want a GOOD horror movie, be sure to take a ride on the MMT!

I remember first seeing a preview for "Midnight Meat Train" when I went to see "Rambo" (which by the way was a great movie) in the theater earlier this year. It would make sense that "Midnight Meat Train" was promoted before "Rambo" since both movies displayed graphic violence and were distributed by Lions Gate Entertainment. I recall thinking "This movie looks rather interesting". However I never saw the movie in any of the theaters in my neighborhood, so I forgot about it.

One night last month I found that "Midnight Meat Train" was playing on "Demand TV" so I watched it. I have to say that this movie is quite bizarre and creepy but fits very well in the horror genre. I suppose a movie that has the Clive Barker name attached to it is a good thing. I must admit I felt this Brian De Palma or Alfred Hitchcock (with added gore) thing going on while I watched this movie. I would recommend this movie to horror movie enthusiasts; I don't think it would disappoint them.

The movie follows an aspiring photographer played by Bradley Cooper. Now had I not been a fan of the television series "Nip/Tuck" I wouldn't know who Bradley Cooper is. He played a supporting character in season five of "Nip/Tuck"; well here he plays the lead. I must say he does a good job. Anyway, Cooper's character is able to get a meeting with a big wig art/photo promoter played stylishly by Brooke Shields (who also was in "Nip/Tuck" season 4...hmmm). Shield's character states that Cooper's work isn't "edgy" enough for the city that is New York and tells him to keep trying.

So this takes our protagonist to the shadowy and dark parts of the New York City nights in order to capture "edgy" still life. In the process he follows an attractive female model on the subway and takes her photo. Then the next day finds out via newspaper that this same model has gone missing. This leads our protagonist to again visit the subway and this time as he is taking photographs he witnesses a murder.

Now mind you he take photos of the murder and after lots and lots of developing realizes that the murderer is more than likely responsible for the disappearance (and likely death) of the model our protagonist followed the first night he was shooting "edgy" photography. Now to really make matters strange, the murder (Vinnie Jones) is a butcher by day, serial killer by night. This leads to our protagonist becoming obsessed with piecing the puzzle of this mystery together and being pushed to the edge of insanity in the process.

I will not give anything away, because this truly was a "different" type of horror movie. I will admit there were a couple of ridiculous parts (some dubious CGI and a part where our "hero" successfully jumps on the "Meat Train" when it is traveling at full speed), but I was able to forgive them because this really was a good horror film, with many twits and turns.

I do think the one thing that might have hurt this movie was the title, "Midnight Meat Train". Now the title was appropriate to the content of the film, but it sounds a lot like a porno movie, honestly. I don't know what else the movie could have been called, maybe "Subway Slaughter" or "Murder on the Metro". Perhaps my movie titles are just as bad; it doesn't omit the fact that "Midnight Meat Train" is a daft name for a horror movie.

For fans of horror literature, the origins of Midnight Meat Train are well known. Included in the "Books of Blood" collection, it has long been a favorite amongst Clive Barker's many fans. Despite being a classic, not many (myself included) would have expected a film adaptation of this, the reason being the entire short story takes place in a subway train and well, how could you make a movie of this? Well it is here and Ryuhei Kitamura, a cult director from Japan known for over-the-top films like "Versus", has done an admirable job of adapting Barker's story to film format.

In a large unnamed American city, midnight subway commuters are being slaughtered by a strange, mute, imposing figure with a cleaver. He is somehow able to carry on his deeds without the police or anyone noticing as his victims' bodies are promptly disposed of and are usually reported as "disappearances" in the media. That is until the killer catches the attention of a young photographer who likes to shoot strange, disturbing urban landscapes. The photographer will soon realize that his intrusions could cost him a lot more than just his job. Much, much more...

This film starts off very strange, with a definite aura of mystique to it. Why is nobody noticing the killings? Who is this enigmatic killer, and what are his motives? It takes a while, but these things do eventually get unraveled. Throughout the film, there are some very powerful suspense scenes, and not all in the train either. As a matter of fact, most of the film takes place outside of the subway station, which is somewhat of a relief because otherwise it probably would have a stretched a thin concept a little too far. The subway scenes themselves are expertly done, maximizing the sense of claustrophobia: where can you go, or possibly hide, inside a subway car?

As for the gore, it is extremely graphic and gratuitous, almost to the point of being comical, but those who have seen Kitamura's other films would expect no less from him. Although my star rating might seem a little low, I do think "Midnight Meat Train" is a good horror film. What it came down to for me is that it was a rather unpleasant viewing experience because of how dark, grimy, despairing and without hope it is. I realize this is probably what the director was going for though. A good renter, and certainly one of the better Barker film adaptations, which I would rank third right behind Hellraiser and Candyman.

I hadn't even heard of this movie until the cover caught my eye. I was pleasantly surprised by how well it was made. Decent acting and a script with enough twists and turns kept this interesting. The direction was very nice, and for the most part the tons of gore looked realistic. Based on a short story from Clive Barker, you really get a Barker feel from parts of the movie. What could have been a straight up slasher films, has elements of supernatural and twisted things that are so typical from a Clive Barker story. This is a good find for any fan of horror.

Quite possibly the most overlooked and mishandled horror films of the past 20 years, The Midnight Meat Train truly lives up to it's title and MPAA Unrated status. Ryuhei Kitamura does a masterful job of directing this bloodbath with some of the most innovative kill shots even seen in a horror film. Vinny Jones is perfectly cast as the butcher (aka Mahogany) who maims, dismembers and disembowels the passengers unlucky enough to board his late night train. What separates The Midnight Meat Train from the usual run of the mill horror film is the sheer brutality and violence that is presented unflinchingly by Kitamura. The ending of the film is shocking (to say the least) and one of the best I have ever seen. I'm still baffled as to how Lionsgate could have mishandled this film so poorly as it got virtually no theatrical release and no promotion. This is truly one of the strongest horror films of the past decade.

All I can about "Midnight Meat Train" is WOW!

I'm not a Clive Barker fan and I really don't like horror movies, however I will watch them on occasion. Wow, I'm glad I took a chance on "Midnight Meat Train"!

Vinnie Jones (Snatch, Hell Ride), Bradley Cooper (Wedding Crashers) & Leslie Bibb (Talladega Nights, Wristcutters: A Love Story) star in this movie and they do a great job!

Blood, guts, gore and everything else you fit into a flick like this!

I admittedly had to put down my plate of food after seeing Mahogany (Vinnie Jones) work on himself in front of the mirror, if you've seen the movie, you know what I mean!

I loved the ending, very original and surprising!

Sick, sick stuff......

Clive Barker must be a vegetarian.

How else to explain the fact that villain Mahogany (Vinnie Jones) in Midnight Meat Train is a butcher of livestock by day, butcher of men by night?

If Midnight Meat Train was merely about killing people, it would be another long entry in lame murder movies like Terror Train. But it's actually about voyeurism - how we the audience can't tear our eyes away from gore - and director Ryûhei Kitamura pounds that point home with a mallet.

Leon (Bradley Cooper) is a budding photographer trying to capture the spirit of the city. But art patron Susan Hoff (Brooke Shields, all severe curves) pushes for more - more visceral, more dangerous, more real. She doesn't want the anticipation of the moment, she wants to SEE the moment - in the same way modern horror movies now shower us with gore that was hinted at in older films. Hoff wants less PG-13 and more hard R.

And she gets it when Leon discovers a terrible secret in Mahogany. Changing clothes from his butcher apron to a suit and tie, the blue-collar master of meat becomes a white-collar killing machine. You can dress up a killer, Barker seems to say, but he's still a killer. All the while Leon clicks away with his camera, drawn into a cesspool of death and sacrifice.

The gore is inventively shot, which results in the occasionally goofy kill (see Ted Raimi's eyeball fly at the camera!). The movie is relentlessly dreary with its blue lens, which is a bit (pardon the pun) overkill. If Se7en has taught us anything it's that all beautiful things in blue-lensed movies must suffer, so its no surprise when that's precisely what happens to just about everyone involved.

But Midnight Meat Train is something different. I'm not fond of films based on Barker's work, including the bookend to his series of short stories, The Book of Blood. Midnight Meat Train is actually a retelling of H.P. Lovecraft's Pickman's Model, and that it manages to end with a punch worthy of Lovecraft is high praise indeed. Horror fans will find Midnight Meat Train messy, bloody, and very, very meaty.

Man, I wanted to like this one. I really, really did. Clive Barker's had much better movie adaptations of his work than Stephen King has had.

Unfortunately that stops with Midnight Meat train.

The beginning is TERRIFIC. The stuff that was added to flesh out Clive Barker's short story worked pretty well. There was a nice cameo by Ted Raimi. But then it gets too convoluted, switches primary characters and falls apart. In the end this movie even manages to bungle the City Fathers.

The thing is, the movie had *so much* going for it. It could have been a classic.

Atmosphere? Check.

Creepy settings? Check.

Interesting story? Check.

Decent actors? Check. (Well, they're good for a low budget horror film.)

Good direction? Usually. The 'action movie' direction (and fight scenes) seem out of place with the horror story and the CGI is pretty cheesy. I wonder what Marcus Nispel who did the respectable Texas Chainsaw remake or Alexandre Aja who did the excellent Hills Have Eyes remake could have done with this one.

Good screenplay? Not so much. Too bad Clive didn't write this script himself. The direction could have been better but was serviceable. It's the screenplay that fails here. The film takes a noticeable left turn after the first hour and you can feel the scriptwriter just trying to pad the story out to keep a decent running time.

Worth watching for the beginning, but don't be surprised to find yourself frustrated with the movie after a while.