A Rundown of the 13 Best, Most Recent Horror Movies I’ve Seen
[13 of 13]
THE MIDNIGHT MEAT TRAIN (July 2008)


The horror in Midnight Meat Train can be found just as much in Leon’s descent into obsession and the gradual fraying of his relationship with Maya, as it can in the spectacularly over-the-top gore, delivered on-screen by a silently scowling Vinnie Jones, who plays the butcher Mahogany.

Read the entire review here.

Parting shot: Well, that’s it for this year’s list. Let’s see what the next dozen months have to offer horrorwise, so we can see how those titles will impact 2009’s rundown.
Happy Halloween!

(The Midnight Meat Train UK quad courtesy of shocktillyoudrop.com.)

THE MIDNIGHT MEAT TRAIN
(Review)

Down the subway steps, token in hand. Through the automatic gates. The smell of the tunnels was in his nostrils now. Not the smell of the deep tunnels of course. They had a scent all of their own. But there was reassurance even in the stale electric air of this shallow line. The regurgitated breath of a million travellers circulated in this warren, mingling with the breath of creatures far older; things with voices soft like clay, whose appetites were abominable. How he loved it. The scent, the dark, the thunder.


So, for whatever reason they may have had—petty studio politics, or a conscious attempt of a studio to move towards more mainstream fare—this one was screwed by Lionsgate in the US, dumped into a pitiful 102 dollar and second-run theatres simply to fulfill contractual obligations.
I can only hope that this finds blazing life on DVD, because it certainly deserves it.

Based on Clive Barker’s short story from his landmark Books of Blood collection, Ryuhei Kitamura’s The Midnight Meat Train finds struggling photographer Leon Kaufman (Alias and Kitchen Confidential’s Bradley Cooper) on the brink of staking out some wall space at a group exhibit by noted art dealer Susan Hoff (Brooke Shields); all he needs is to “capture the heart of the city.”
But what happens when a city’s heart isn’t exactly pure?
We all know what Nietzsche said about staring into abysses, yes?

New York was just a city.
He had seen her wake in the morning like a slut, and pick murdered men from between her teeth, and suicides from the tangles of her hair. He had seen her late at night, her dirty back streets shamelessly courting depravity. He had watched her in the hot afternoon, sluggish and ugly, indifferent to the atrocities that were being committed every hour in her throttled passages.


It’s Cooper’s portrayal of Leon—in tandem with that of Popular’s Leslie Bibb (who plays Leon’s supportive girlfriend Maya)—that serves to ground this dark tale of servitude and ritual and death, as the photographer finds himself spiraling into the shadows of the inner workings of the vast metropolis, where people go missing every day, some never to be found again.
The chemistry between Cooper and Bibb brings a warm and tender life to the couple, making them genuine and real, thus making the inexorable slide to the film’s brutal climax all the harder.
The horror in Midnight Meat Train can be found just as much in Leon’s descent into obsession and the gradual fraying of his relationship with Maya, as it can in the spectacularly over-the-top gore, delivered on-screen by a silently scowling Vinnie Jones, who plays the butcher Mahogany.

Another reason why I so looked forward to this adaptation was because Jonathan Sela was the cinematographer on-board, and though I do feel he captured more striking and riveting imagery in The Omen remake and in Rohtenburg (review in Archive), Sela’s contribution here is nonetheless undeniable.
Kitamura—who brought us Versus and Azumi—is the kind of director who needs a great cinematographer to bring his wild visions to the screen, and Sela certainly does that.

“We are the City fathers,” the thing said. “And mothers, and daughters and sons. The builders, the law-makers. We made this city.”
“New York?” said Kaufman. The Palace of Delights?
“Before you were born, before anyone living was born.”


If there’s somewhere Midnight Meat Train falters, it’s in not quite living up to the portrayal of New York-as-moral cesspool that Barker nailed down so eloquently with his brilliant prose in the short story; the setting doesn’t quite crystallize into its own seedy character here.
There’s also the climax, which doesn’t manage to convey the awful breadth and enormity of the horror that lies beneath the streets of New York, Leon’s “Palace of Delights.”
It’s as if, post-9/11, the thought of emphasizing the depiction of the city as something built on the foundations of an ancient—and on-going—inhumanity seemed in, ahem, bad taste.

Whether or not that was part of the reasoning behind screenwriter Jeff Buhler’s choices when he adapted the short story, it’s ultimately still an aspect of the film that doesn’t work as well as I’d hoped.
Which is not to say the final stretch of the third act goes all pussy on us, mind. There’s still some wild bits in there; it’s just not as potent as the source material.
Sadly, we also don’t get that chilling “original American” moment…

Beyond its ability to successfully capture certain aspects of the short story, there’s also the matter of the underutilization of Roger Bart, who doesn’t really do much here.
I’m also not quite sold on the film’s use of CGI, particularly in the train bits…

The meat of her back had been entirely cleft open from neck to buttock and the muscle had been peeled back to expose the glistening vertebrae. It was the final triumph of The Butcher’s craft. Here they hung, these shaved, bled, slit slabs of humanity, opened up like fish, and ripe for devouring.


Still and all, The Midnight Meat Train is worth a look-see, whether or not you’re a Barker fan.
It’s also a very promising sign for the upcoming adaptations from the Books of Blood collection, Anthony DiBlasi’s Dread, John Harrison’s Book of Blood, Pig Blood Blues, and The Madonna (the last two still without attached directors, as far as I know).
After that initial cinematic flurry back in the day which included the first two Hellraiser films, Nightbreed, Candyman, and Lord of Illusions, Barker’s name has been mostly absent from big screen horror. (Yes, he produced the excellent, Oscar-nominated Gods and Monsters, but that wasn’t a horror movie.)

Barker’s inactivity on the film front is a crime as far as I’m concerned, considering all the blackly wondrous sights he’s brought to the screen in the past, whether as director or as the writer whose work has been adapted.
I’d still like to see that Director’s Cut of Nightbreed, or actually have Barker in the director’s chair again (though he’s gone on the record to say that this isn’t anywhere on his to-do list at the moment), but barring that, excellent adaptations of his fiction certainly sound delectable to me.
Yes, there have been some less-than-thrilling ones: Rawhead Rex, anyone? But when it’s a Candyman, how can you argue with that?
And yes, I’m still waiting for that Thief of Always adaptation…


There was a horrible familiarity about this ritual. It rang a bell—not in Kaufman’s conscious mind, but in his deeper, older self.
His feet, no longer obeying his mind, but his instinct to worship, moved. He walked through the corridor of bodies and stepped out of the train.

(The Midnight Meat Train OS and images courtesy of shocktillyoudrop.com.)

(All italicized quotes by Clive Barker, from “The Midnight Meat Train,” Books of Blood Volume One, 1984.)

AFTERTHOUGHTS (76)
BARKER’S TRAIN NEEDS A PUSH

After getting its release date repeatedly pushed further and further down the line, Ryuhei Kitamura’s adaptation of Clive Barker’s The Midnight Meat Train will reportedly his theatres on August 1st, in a very limited release of approximately 100 screens, apparently only to fulfill contractual obligations, before being shuffled off to DVD.
It’s a sad move, given the recent resurgence of R-rated horror at the box office. The success of both M. Night Shyamalan’s The Happening and Bryan Bertino’s The Strangers has, at least for the moment, put the kibosh on the industry thinking that only PG-13 horror could turn a profit.
The Midnight Meat Train could very well be a hit as well, if it actually reaches a wide enough audience.
To that end, Barker himself has released this statement:

“As you may or may not have heard, due to certain politics, Midnight Meat Train is in danger of Lionsgate not giving it a wide release. I’m asking you to please help spread the word in order for all to enjoy this film. I want to passionately encourage everybody who cares about my work to use this chance to change the minds of the folks at Lionsgate.
“Anything any of you can do—be it e-mails, web postings, word of mouth and the like—to help encourage this movement would be deeply appreciated. The film is worth the effort in my mind, and I do not want to see my work fall by the wayside.”

The “certain politics” Barker makes mention of apparently refers to the recent studio regime change at Lionsgate. The changing of the guard at studios always causes upheaval, and sadly, some films get caught in the backwash.
It seems The Midnight Meat Train could end up as one of those films.

So, you heard the man.
Head on over to Revelations, and help get the Train into theatres where it belongs.

Parting shot: The Midnight Meat Train, based on the Books of Blood short story, stars Bradley Cooper, Leslie Bibb, Roger Bart, Brooke Shields, and the one and only Vinnie Jones. And it’s shot by the excellent Jonathan Sela (DP on Martin Weisz‘s Rohtenburg and John Moore‘s redux of The Omen), so it should also look spectacular.
The film enjoys its World Premiere at this year’s FanTasia Film Festival in Canada; see Afterthoughts (75) in the Archive.

(The Midnight Meat Train OS courtesy of twitchfilm.net; images courtesy of shocktillyoudrop.com.)

AFTERTHOUGHTS (11)

11.1 They’re like the coolest comic book team-ups ever! Seriously.
I mean, Guillermo Del Toro and Clive Barker?! Guillermo Del Toro and Neil Gaiman?! Awesomeness!
Awesomeness on a level so high, this wasn’t even on my most fevered wish list.
Awesomeness…
Oh. Right. Sorry.

Pause.
Rewind.
Play.

Like directors Luc Besson and Michael Bay, Guillermo Del Toro has, of late, made himself mighty conspicuous on the producing end of things, with films like Cronicas (Chronicles) and El Orfanato (The Orphanage).
Now, among the film projects Del Toro is currently producing are two of particular note.

The first, the long-awaited film adaptation of Neil Gaiman’s Death: The High Cost of Living.
Having languished in what Gaiman calls “… a kind of weird `getting-it-made’ hell” for quite a while now, this one’s gradually coming together at long last, and will reportedly contain scenes Gaiman had to cut out of the comic book due to the limited page count. Shia LaBeouf is also reportedly in the running to play Sexton Furnival, in what will be Gaiman’s feature film directorial debut.

The second, Daniel Simpson’s Born, a horror film starring Jennifer Connelly and Paul Bettany, with Del Toro and Barker in two of the producing chairs; Barker also co-wrote the script.
It’s about a stop-motion animator whose creations begin to live out some horrific nightmare in the real world.

What did I say?
Awesomeness.

11.2 And while we’re talking about Clive Barker, there’re some more Barkerian projects coming down the pike.

First up is the currently filming Midnight Meat Train (based on the Books of Blood short story of the same name), starring Bradley Cooper (Will Tippin from Alias) and Bullet Tooth Tony himself, Vinnie Jones. Also in the cast are Brooke Shields, Roger Bart (hilarious in The Producers and Frank Oz’s The Stepford Wives, and I’m guessing not so hilarious in Hostel: Part II), and Popular’s Leslie Bibb (soon to be seen in Trick ‘r Treat and Iron Man).
This one’s got the excellent cinematographer Jonathan Sela (John Moore’s The Omen remake and Martin Weisz’s Rohtenburg: review in Achive: June 2007) on-board, and is being directed by Ryuhei Kitamura (who helmed the bizarre gangsters and zombies flick, Versus).

Also in development are two other Books of Blood tales, Pig Blood Blues and The Book of Blood.
Additionally, Barker has penned the script for the upcoming Hellraiser remake.
There’s also the long-in-gestation The Thief of Always, which has been knocking about for a yonk’s age. It was recently reported that Shrek 2 and Spirit: Stallion of the Cimarron helmer Kelly Asbury, was taking the director’s chair.

Meanwhile, I honestly have no idea as to the status of Barker’s Tortured Souls, which seems to have fallen into the same “`getting-it-made’ hell” The High Cost of Living was in till recently.

Ah, well. There’s Midnight Meat Train to look forward to first.
And Born.
Sweet.

(Images courtesy of telegraph.co.uk [Guillermo Del Toro]; www-news.uchicago.edu [Neil Gaiman]; locusmag.com [Clive Barker]; clearvisionmpg.com [Born OS]; and shocktillyoudrop.com [Midnight Meat Train image of Vinnie Jones as Mahogany].)

ROHTENBURG
(aka GRIMM LOVE)
(Review)

Katie Armstrong (Felicity herself, Keri Russell) is an American graduate student in Germany, whose chosen thesis subject is the case of Oliver Hartwin (Thomas Kretschmann, most widely known for his role as Captain Englehorn in Peter Jackson’s King Kong), who found a willing victim in Simon Grombeck (Thomas Huber, seen in the live action Aeon Flux), and ate him.
This is the chillingly gruesome premise of Martin Weisz’s first feature film, Rohtenburg (Grimm Love in the US, where it is currently on the festival circuit), a disturbing portrait of that dark territory where the positive, life-affirming traits of love, collide with the self-destructive tendencies of the disturbed and the deranged.
After establishing himself firmly in the commercial and music video worlds, Weisz delivers a solid and controversial debut, which ended up getting banned in Germany.

Relying largely on flashbacks, we accompany Katie on her journey of discovery as she travels the footpaths and backroads of Oliver’s and Simon’s lives, to perhaps better understand what led them to that place and time where one allowed the other to eat him, in order to consummate their love.
And with the largely chronological nature of the flashbacks, it quickly becomes apparent that the script by T.S. Faull is moving inexorably towards Katie’s viewing of the video Oliver shot of the death of Simon, an act that will perhaps allow her to fill the hole in her life left by some undisclosed loss. Katie believes that if she can somehow come to understand the truth behind that singular confluence where Oliver and Simon found each other, then perhaps she can come to grips with her own personal darkness.

With haunting music by Steven Gutheinz and the bleak, cold beauty of Jonathan Sela’s cinematography*, Rohtenburg is a riveting descent into the damaged lives of lonely, scarred individuals, who are only really yearning for that one particular other who can make them feel safe, and whole, who can understand them completely, who can look into their souls and not flinch from the abyss that waits there.
With strangely similar family backgrounds (estranged father, mentally unstable mother), Oliver and Simon seem like nothing so much as mirror selves, merely waiting for fate to allow them to see the other’s reflection, and to let them heal each other in the dark, ghoulish manner which they desire.

Kretschmann is hypnotic as the schizophrenic Oliver, who embraces the macabre urges that roil inside him, who, in his youth, only ever experienced giving—in his round-the-clock caring for his mother—can now really only take, to satisfy the child perpetually starved of affection. (His plea for more willing victims over the internet is simply the child in the candy shop, demanding more sweets.)
Huber meanwhile, is the sad and desperate picture of the secret victim, who tries to maintain a normal relationship with lover Felix (Marcus Lucas), while trawling the net in the early morning hours, visiting websites like the Cannibal Cantina, to sate his deviant hungers. And while Oliver’s need is to absorb, Simon’s is to be absorbed, to be completely subsumed—and more pointedly, consumed—by the act of love. (One of the most disturbing moments of the film—and there are many—is when Simon tells a male prostitute what he wants done to his penis.)
And as clearly warped and twisted as these psyches are, when they meet over the internet, there is a mutual, instinctual understanding that they have indeed found their other. It is one of Rohtenburg’s triumphs that the flurry of emails back and forth between Oliver and Simon is both a heartfelt exchange and a wildly disturbing taste of the extremes to which some people will go to find love.

And as witness to this bizarre relationship, Russell is effective as the audience’s proxy, also damaged and scarred by life (though perhaps not as much as either Oliver or Simon), trying to scry for the truth in the shadowed mirror of a love soured by death, of a union where eros and thanatos lay in each other’s arms, whispered sweet nothings into each other’s ears, then proceeded to sink their teeth into each other’s haunches.

Clearly, Rohtenburg is not to everyone’s tastes (pun most definitely intended). The material is decidedly dark and morbid.
But it is also imbued with a Gothic lyricism that never allows the film to become sordid and tawdry in the way other movies of the bizarre from last year—notably Terry Gilliam’s Tideland and Gyorgy Palfi’s Taxidermia—are.
While other films seem more content to repulse and revolt, Rohtenburg’s aim is to disturb and provoke. Where is the line that separates right from wrong where love is concerned? Consenting adults, after all. And these are the people their pathologies have made them into. This is their understanding of “love.” What right does society have to say otherwise?

Perhaps the saddest note in all this though, is the fact that Weisz went from horror with significant subtext to The Hills Have Eyes 2 (review in Archive: April 2007), exactly the sort of movie whose only real purpose is to repulse and revolt. Given what he achieved in Rohtenburg, I can only hope The Hills Have Eyes 2 was an aberration, and that his next film will have as much, ahem, to chew on, as Rohtenburg does.

* Jonathan Sela’s excellent cinematography can also be seen in John Moore‘s remake of The Omen, and in the upcoming film adaptation of Clive Barker’s Midnight Meat Train.

Parting shot: Rohtenburg earned Wiesz the Best Director nod at the 39th Sitges International Film Festival (Europe’s biggest fantasy-horror fest). It also snagged the Best Actor award, shared between Kretschmann and Huber, and Best Cinematography for Sela.

Parting shot 2: Rohtenburg is inspired by the real life case of the Metzgermeister (“Master Butcher”), Armin Meiwes. It was Meiwes’ complaint that his “personality rights” had been violated that resulted in the German ban.

(Rohtenburg and Grimm Love OS’s courtesy of impawards com; film image courtesy of bilder.filmstarts.de.)