Creep (2004)

CreepKate is waiting for the train at Charing Cross Underground station. She falls asleep, and when she wakes up there’s nobody around and the place has been locked up for the night. Even if the entire place has been deserted and she’s the only one there, an empty train suddenly arrives. Not knowing what else to do, she boards it, hoping to get away from the place. Then, it stops and all the lights go out. Then she finds out that the place was not entirely abandoned after all, as she meets one of her coworkers who keeps following her around and eventually attempts to rape her. She is saved by someone unknown, who drags the guy out of the train, and when Kate sees a glimpse of him covered in blood, she starts running. Then Kate meets a homeless couple, Jimmy and Mandy. They also have a dog called Ray. After offering some payment, Jimmy reluctantly agrees to follow Kate to the night guard, but they will be hunted by someone else who is prowling the underground station, looking for victims…

 

Creep is a horror film from 2004, written and directed by Christopher Smith (who later directed Triangle (2009). Creep was his directorial debut, and there was also a game made called Creep: The Last Tube in 2005 which was used to promote the film. While the game went down nearly 14 years later, the developer helped making sure the game didn’t end up as lost media, and was uploaded to Archive.org.

 

Creep may at first appear to be similar to The Midnight Meat Train, but those are very different. In Creep, a lot of the movie relies heavily on portraying Kate’s feelings of being trapped and surrounded by danger all around. The movie doesn’t start off with lengthy character depictions or backstories, we simply see a young woman waiting for a train and nodding off, waking up in a place that appears to be deserted. Places that use to bustle with people where you’re used to seeing them filled with the regular everyday stress, will always seem slightly surreal and nightmarish when totally empty. Of course, Kate eventually finds that she is not entirely alone after all, there’s danger from all around and this is what makes all the twists and turns come somewhat unexpected. I say somewhat, since there is a short opening scene in the film which hints that there is indeed someone malicious in that underground station. And the actor playing this someone, this creep, is Sean Harris (who has the leading role in Possum from 2018) who is a method actor who didn’t socialize with anyone throughout the shoot. Also, none of them ever saw his makeup prior to shooting the scenes, a process which took seven hours each day. Whew! I also guess going into it so blindly must have been quite an experience for the other actors, and probably caused some genuine reactions.

 

While there are some grisly scenes and a little bit of gore here, some scenes are offscreen so there isn’t really enough to warrant a gore-badge. There’s a little bit of illogical nonsense here and there, but nevertheless Creep is an overall fun horror movie well worth a watch.

 

Creep

 

Writer and director: Christopher Smith
Country & year: United Kingdom, 2004
Actors: Franka Potente, Sean Harris, Vas Blackwood, Ken Campbell, Kathryn Gilfeather, Grant Ibbs, Joe Anderson, Jeremy Sheffield, Sean De Vrind, Ian Duncan
IMDb: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0381966/

 

 

Vanja Ghoul

 

 

 

The Midnight Meat Train (2008)

The Midnight Meat TrainLeon is a photographer who is totally over the moon when the famous gallery owner Susan is willing to take a look at his work. This soon ends up as quite a blow to his ego, however, when she criticizes him for not being bold enough with his pictures. Despite being let down by this, he decides to take more risks when photographing the city, and goes on a search for the most gritty shots he can find. One night, he takes pictures of a group of men behaving threateningly towards a young woman, and ends up rescuing her as the guys just decide to beat it due to the security cameras nearby. Leon is satisfied with both his heroic deed and some possibly successful photographs he can use, but the next day he discovers that the woman he rescued went missing the same night. So, what to do? Well, the only responsible thing someone could do in a situation like this: he goes to the police and delivers the photographs he took from that night. The result is that he is practically just being scoffed at, which makes Leon even more intrigued. He starts his own investigation and discovers that there are numerous reports of people that have gone missing under similar circumstances. His investigation leads him to a butcher named Mahogany, and Leon suspects that this man is a serial killer that’s been killing subway passengers for many years.

 

The Midnight Meat Train is a horror film from 2008, based on a short story by Clive Barker by the same name. The story was written in 1984, and is included on the first volume of Books of Blood. The movie was directed by Ryuhei Kitamura, and while getting fairly positive reviews, it was only given a very limited theatrical release and ended up quickly on DVD. Barker was, naturally, quite angry with Lionsgate because of this. The movie certainly didn’t get the theatrical run it should’ve had, but nowadays it’s extensively available on both physical releases and several streaming sites.

 

As far as the comparisons go between the short story and the movie, the original story portrayed Leon as a bored loner in a city he used to idealize before moving there (and realizing what a shithole it actually is), while in the movie he’s got a girlfriend and a passion for photography. While I personally prefer the original story’s premise more than the movie’s, I understand how the change was necessary when implementing a bit of detective investigation. While you get a lot of things spoiled already in the opening scene, where you get to know that the title implies exactly what you’ll get, it still manages to offer enough suspense and feeling of mystery throughout. The gore is aplenty with some really visceral scenes on board the “meat train”, where guts, eyeballs and severed heads are flying around the screen like it was supposed to be a 3D production. A jolly good time indeed! The only slight disappointment for my part is the ending, which seemed rather underwhelming compared to the original story.

 

The Midnight Meat Train is a gritty and atmospheric horror film, well acted and with some very effective gore scenes (although the CGI effects are a little bit outdated in some parts, but overall decent enough). It stands well together with the other Clive Barker adaptions, like Lord of Illusions.

 

The Midnight Meat Train The Midnight Meat Train The Midnight Meat Train

 

Director: Ryûhei Kitamura
Writer: Jeff Buhler
Country & year: US, UK, 2008
Actors: Bradley Cooper, Leslie Bibb, Brooke Shields, Vinnie Jones, Roger Bart, Tony Curran, Barbara Eve Harris, Peter Jacobson, Stephanie Mace, Ted Raimi, Nori Satô, Quinton ‘Rampage’ Jackson
IMDb: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0805570/

 

 

Vanja Ghoul