“I’ve got a train to catch” – Leon. After taking the train from the city with my brother and we sat in the last seats next to the wall, the train around us empty and not a soul but us in sight, Sycko says “This reminds me of Midnight meat train.” I looked around and drew a blank not knowing what he was talking about then he briefly explained the movie to me and added it to my list. This film is based on a short story that Clive Barker wrote in his collection, “Books of Blood” Directed by Ryuhei Kitamura, we the viewer are introduced to an immediate visual of a slaying on a train in the middle of the night and we catch a short glimpse of the killer. The camera work in this film I adored. As the viewer I felt as the victim at times hanging upside down and blood running down from my neck thanks to the camera angles. Cutting to a scene we watch as a man with a camera walks around the city snapping pictures of whatever he may find interesting, otherwise known as Leon, our main character. Leon is a photographer looking to make it big in his career. We find out that he has a girlfriend named Maya and she presses him on to get to know more well-known photographers and she mentions that she already set up an appointment for a well-known photographer to look at his work. He meets with the photographer and she is immediately unpleased with his work and tells him to see her when he’s captured something better.
Searching for more images as he mentioned earlier that his passion was to photograph the city. He wanders into the city and follows three men who catch his attention as they create havoc wherever they walk. Snapping pictures of the men he wanders into the subway after them and continues taking pictures as they begin to bother a young woman on the stairs. Leon calls out to them to leave the woman alone and threatens to hurt them if they got closer. Of course they got closer and walked up the stairs and he starts taking pictures again as one of the men glares directly into the camera, then stopping after Leon points out the camera to their left. Now I’m not sure if this film was meant to take place in New York, but I know that no New Yorker would allow a man to take a picture of them and walk away. We would grab that damn camera and smash the lens into the fucker’s brain and destroy the surveillance camera then fly away because we do have super powers. The woman thanks the man for saving her and kisses him. Eww, I wouldn’t kiss a stranger. She takes the next train and listens to music. A man behind her approaches and pulls out a meat cleaver and hits her in the head. Our main killer does his killings in a butcher man by hanging them up in a train cart afterwards.
Ah! Not my face!!
Leon the goes home and develops the photos like a good boy and is excited to show the famous photographer his new image with he had a feeling she would love. He then notices a news article stating that a woman was missing, the same woman that he saved the night before. He does a bit of research in his photos and is able to see that there is a hand with a ring on it grasping the door as she is about to enter. immediately figuring out that the man ring matched the ring he saw on another man whom he photographed another day with the same ring leaving the same station. He goes to the police and the woman there does not believe his story and assumes that he was just stalking her because she was a model and gives him her business card when he decides to make up his mind on what really happened. Leon then goes to see the photographer woman and show him the picture of the men that he took and she was enthralled with the image and told him to take five more of the photos and that he would be in her show. A lot of the paintings shown in the scene are actually provided by Clive Barker himself. Leon runs off into the night back into the city and pursues the man with the ring who he suspects and follows him around for a bit and finds out that he works as a butcher. Lets take a look at what our supposed killer looks like!
Creeper...
Our main character eventually parades around in butchers clothing trying to follow this dude and nobody around him who passes by says anything. Maybe they all didn’t like the guy? No idea. Our buddy Leon becomes so slick that he is able to board the train and witness him killing people on the empty train. He removes their teeth, eyes and nails then shaves their hair off. Mr. butcher is clever though! He knows Leon is watching and attacks him and hangs him upside down like the others. What I didn’t understand is that he didn’t kill him, he let Leon go with some cuts on his face and a cut the same as the one on his ring on his chest. Leon goes home and washes off as Maya screams at the door noticing how insane her man is. She sees the cuts and then decides to investigate for herself to see if he really is the killer. Maya and her friend go into his apartment and go through his things but our killer arrives and kills the friend and leaves him in the bathtub as Maya goes through his weird bag that he carries around the whole time and keeps a copy of train schedules dated as far back as the early 1900′s. Maya takes the evidence to the cop and demands her to hand it over and she lies and says that she doesn’t have it. Leading her back to find the killer on the 2am train, little did she know that Leon was doing the same dressed as a butcher at another stop.
Haha!!
Leon jumps on the train as he sees Maya inside and breaks a window in order to get in, and survives! The butcher is about to attack Maya as she missed shooting him with a gun until he sees Leon and goes after him in an epic fight scene. It was all like BAM! POW! KICK! Batman style. Eventually Leon pushes the killer out of the train and Maya and Leon caress and touch each other’s naughty parts, well not really. The train comes to a halt and the conductor shows up and says, “Stay away from the Meat.” Then walks away. Ha! Isn’t that an epic line?! The train stops and they hop off and they are in the middle of piles of bones and the butcher is still alive but dies by getting a bone struck in his throat and then he says the only three words which I can’t remember. Sorry dudes! Honestly the movie was interesting enough for me to watch it and I adored at the gory scenes, but it didn’t get as good until the last four minutes where we find out that the conductor kills Maya and that now Leon has to become the butcher since he just died. The butcher killed to feel these fucking ugly creature things that live down there. Never saw that coming!
The next scene leads us to the “Woah” part. Leon dressed in a gray suit, wearing the ring AND the cop was in on this the entire time because she was there giving him the train schedule tickets in a hotel room. Leon then walks out and we notice his haircut, same as the previous dude. He finally turns around and we get to see his face and I screamed a little inside. Without this little twister in the end I would have like this film a bit less. Is it a must see? Hell yes. They all are. Until the next time we “meat” take the train and think about which one of the people around you are the most willing to kill you and hang out upside down. Then scream at that person for their evilness and invite them out for a drink to convince them other wise.
Till Next time,
– Sycka
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