Customer Reviews

Night Train to Venice [VHS]

5 star:		(0)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(7)

 

 

Without stating the obvious, this film is so unbelievably bad it isnt even funny. The acting is confused,the plot makes hardly any sense and has one of the most absurd endings in film history. The Makers of this film however deserve some credit for persuading such talented actors as Hugh Grant and Malcolm McDowell to appear in this appalling drivel.

I sat downt to watch this movie with some hope because I generally like Hugh Grant movies, but this movie is absolute garbage. The first half is simple to undestand, but it is boring. The second half is the most incoherent 45 minutes in cinema history. I still do not fully understand this movie. Please anyone reading this do NOT waste time watching this movie. I would rather stare at a blank screen for the same amount of time than watch this mess again.

I have to agree with everyone above, except I'll say unequivocally that it is the absolute worst ever, and I thought I could sit through anything if Hugh Grant was in it. It's true, this video has no redeeming value whatsoever, unless it's that some of the costumes in Venice are cool looking. Positively not worth spending 2 seconds or 2 cents on. There's a lot of horrid, tasteless and pointless violence, without even the satisfaction of understanding why or seeing the villains get their come-uppance at the end. I suppose someone had a fuzzy notion of appearance vs. reality symbolism, but it fails utterly.

Hugh Grant would probably, and should, cringe at seeing this junk available for sale. I rented this movie, before Grant's L.A. escapade. I watched about 30 minutes and was so tortured by how horrible and boring it was, I rewound it and returned it, asking for an exchange. The owner of the video store watched it and threw it out. Grant isn't even cute in this film!

Night Train to Venice is certainly the strangest film I've seen in a long time. Hugh Grant plays a journalist/author who's written a book about neo-nazis. He takes the train to Vienna to see a publisher who may want to publish it. That seems to be the basic plot. But there's lots of strange things going on in the movie. A group of skinheads sneak into the train. Malcolm McDowell appears as a mysterious man. He's mostly shown in slow motion sequences, staring at people. This is intercut with various nonsensical dream sequences, some of which involve a young girl who's also on the train with an old woman. It's all very pretentious but made without any talent. Neither the director or the writers seem interested in telling a story. The movie is about 70 minutes long (there seem to be a 98 minute version too), but were it not for the many slow motion sequences (more than in any John Derek movie) and the long video music style montage sequences it would have been even shorter. Grant eventually arrives in Venice. At this point there's a bizarre plot twist that's played very melodramatically, with Mozart on the soundtrack. The old woman and the girl appear again and the movie ends with a "climax" that's even more bizarre than the rest of the movie, and doesn't seem to have anything to do with the rest of the story. This movie should be studied as an example on how not to write a screenplay or direct a movie.

To sum up, this is an awful movie, but it's also strangely fascinating, because it's like no other movie I've seen. I'm glad I have seen it. And on a side note, as mentioned, the plot involves neo-nazis, and as if things weren't already bizarre enough, the old woman is played by Kristina Söderbaum, who was a big star of Nazi propaganda movies in Germany during World War II.

The whole movie makes no sense at all. Talk about violence for violence sake. There is not one single solitary frame of this mess that would be worth paying a penny to see unless you just want to torture yourself. This movie is nothing personified and taken to heights few other directors will ever reach or want to. Poor Hugh Grant what kind of day must he been having when he said ok to staring in this dreck! Night Train to Venice avoid this ride at all costs. Take the Last Train to Clarksville Instead!

I have to agree with the views expressed by everyone here. We invited friends over to watch it and, after waiting what seemed an endless time for everything to start making sense, not one out of six of us wanted to finish it. Like others here, we couldn't understand why someone like Hugh Grant should have accepted a role in a movie with such a muddled plot.