Midnight Meat Train

Based on Brit horror maven Clive Barker's slushy short story of the same name, this outrageously gory and mean-spirited film is definitely on the right track. After several (mostly poor) attempts to adapt the writer's work for the screen, Midnight Meat Train accurately captures Barker's blatant, blunt brutality which is complimented by his trademark slightly-arch dialogue, and flair for despair. It only falls short when it comes to a climax which over-does Barker's penchant for plotting which relies on the insidious burrowing of unearthly, scarily intelligent creatures into our everyday lives.

Midnight Meat Train the movie unfolds as a failing freelance photographer stumbles upon a crime in progress, and he starts to become an obsessed cross between Weegee and Jack Torrance. Leon (Bradley Cooper), in true "If it bleeds, it leads" fashion, finds his footing in a puddle of blood and moves onward and upward in his career.

Unfortunately, it is not his chosen career: fiendish fate has a different destination in mind for him, and its conductor is a badass butcher known only as Mahogany (Vinnie Jones). As Leon falls into the downward spiral of this wicked otherworld, his fiancée (Leslie Bibb) and best friend (Roger Bart) become proactive and try to find out what's behind Leon's sudden turnabout. Leon's level of fixation is reminiscent of characters from movies such as The Tenant, Se7en, and Zodiac, even though the world depicted here doesn't quite carry the same weight as those.

About as subtle as Mahogany's silver hammer, the symbolism and foreshadowing is everywhere you look. It's difficult to pull this off without being laughable, but for me it only heightened the horror. At its black heart, it's the story of an unknowing apprentice being sucked in as a successor to an age-old supernatural or alienistic death trap (think: The Sentinel, The Shining, The Hitcher, and even that old Twilight Zone episode, "To Serve Man"), but outwardly it's a gruesome and gory red-stuff slasher. (More like a basher: Mahogany's mallet is beyond lethal, and his razory weaponry would make both of the Jeremy Irons in Dead Ringers flush with envy.)

The murder scenes, augmented by maybe a little too much — yet masterful — CGI, are truly sadistic, spiteful and shocking. There's some inventive use of victims' POV, especially one in which the eye-view is seen from a dying, disembodied head rolling along the train car's floor away from its own severed body.

Some of the repulsion setups don't quite work on a logical level (for instance, as Mahogany begins to reach the end of his time and deteriorates, his skin is affected; but it's not really made clear as to why he saves and preserves the sloughed warts in his medicine cabinet. It seems to be there only for the gross-out factor). There are some other suspensions of disbelief you must endure, but I don't think Barker's true fans will mind these — after all, his stories are meant to be fantastical.

The score, written jointly by Johannes Kobilke and Robb Williamson, is striking and effective, while the cinematography of Jonathan Sela more than adds to the entire experience. Had Midnight Meat Train not been shot without such purposeful panache, it would not be nearly as effective. Sela uses classic noir angles, atmosphere, and moody composition, but the usual gloom, shadow and fog of the style is contrasted with bursts of bright, neon colors. The dichotomy is quite refreshing and stimulating. There's also great care taken to show reflections of important visual data through mirrors, eyes, windows, pooled water and puddle blood, etc.

Director Ryuhei Kitamura embraces the style and the brutality, arranging the proceedings in a fast-paced, wholly entertaining manner. Each murder is its own appalling set-piece. However, I do believe he made one crucial error toward the end, by allowing a certain revelation to run on for too long, thereby softening the overall impact of the story.

The acting is appropriately histrionic from Cooper, Bibb and Bart, while Jones exudes menace and believable methodic butchery that's every bit as robotically unsettling as Michael Myers or The Terminator. Brooke Shields, as a predatory gallery curator, is not exactly bad in the film but she over plays the couture-clad cougar, making me think, "Hey, that's Brooke Shields!" every time I saw her, rather than just being absorbed into the cutthroat world of high art in which her character operates and orchestrates. Jeff Buhler's screenplay includes dashes of Barker's judicious use of gallows' humor, but for the most part this is one serious story playing for keeps.

Midnight Meat Train is the best, most brash and original yet true adaptation of Barker's work since 1992's Candyman (though I will admit I have yet to see 1997's Quicksilver Highway, so I am taking that one out of the equation) and as such, it is an absolute must-see.

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