Written by Jeff Buhler
Based on the story by Clive Barker
Directed by Ryuhei Kitamura
Starring Bradley Cooper, Leslie Bibb, Vinnie Jones and Brooke Shields
USA, 2008
You might think a flick with a title like THE MIDNIGHT MEAT TRAIN would be anything but boring. In this case, you’d be wrong. What greater sin is there than a promising title that’s never really delivered on?
Don’t get me wrong. The movie does prominently feature a midnight meat train. So, in a literal sense, the title delivers. But I’m talking about the spirit of the title. This is a title that deserves no holds barred insane exploitation. And instead we get… well, I’m not really sure what.
The premise, like the title, is promising: Bradley Cooper stars as a photographer who wants to capture the gritty realism of the city and pushes the envelope further and further to do it. In his quest he begins to suspect a butcher who rides the subway at night is actually a serial killer, and starts following him around.
This leads to an increasingly strange set of revelations that take the movie’s climax to what should have been a delightfully twisted, fantastical ending, but it all falls flat. I’m not sure why. The cold cinematography? The slow pacing? The incredibly fake-looking CGI blood splatter? I love a good bad special effect here and there, but these ones really rob what should be viscerally disturbing scenes of any weight.
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