31 Nights of Halloween: The Quiet Zone

Today's offering is spooky from beginning to end, and I think the least said up front the better. Check it out and prepare for scares!

The Quiet Zone (2015)
Starring: Jessica Bayly and Kasey Iliana Sfetsios
Director: Andrew Ionides
Rating: Nine of Ten Stars


The only complaint I have about this film is that ending doesn't quite work for me, because it strays into "hitting the viewer over the head with a hammer" territory. Everything else about it I love (even if I'm as squemish as ever when it comes to graphic violence (of which there is a little).

31 Nights of Halloween: The Last Train Home

Who can you trust in the subway? Especially on the last train of the night?

Photo by Tod Fisher

Last Train Home (2008)
Starring: Lara Fisher, Danny Jensen, Jamie Relis, and Andrew Craig
Director: Scion Griffiths
Rating: Seven of Ten Stars

'Night Train to Terror' is terrible

Night Train to Terror (aka "Shiver" and "The Nightmare Never Ends") (1985)
Starring: Richard Moll, John Phillip Law, Arthur M. Braham, Cameron Mitchell, Gabriel Whitehorse, and Robert Bristol
Directors: John Carr and Philip Marschak
Rating: Three of Ten Stars

God and Satan are riding on a doomed night train, reviewing what souls will be going to Heaven and what souls will be going to Hell. Meanwhile, a really lame pop band and its dancers are rehearsing in a well-appointed freight car.

"Night Train to Terror" is an obviously cheap anthology film featuring three tales and a whole lot of really bad musical interludes. Between the stories (one about possibly the most ineptly run insane asylum ever, where they make ends meet by kidnapping people and selling their dismembered body parts to medical schools; one about a med student who falls for a girl and then falls in with "The Death Club"; and one that features parallel stories about a Holocaust survivor and a cop who discover an immortal agent of Satan and the doctor who is charged by God to carve his heart out) we are reminded about everything that was Bad about the early 1980s pop music and performers on the worst, cheapest traincar set ever built.

The three short tales are all pretty strange, but nonetheless creative and engaging in their own twisted sort of way. The second two feature some pretty bad claymation monsters and even worse gore effects, but in the context of the overall kitchiness of the film, its passable.

All-aboard 'The Horror Express'!

Horror Express (1973)
Starring: Peter Cushing, Christopher Lee, Sylvia Totorsa, Telly Savalas, and Helga Line
Director: Eugenio Martin
Rating: Eight of Ten Stars

A British explorer (Lee) finds what he believes to be proof of Darwin's theory of evolution high in a frozen mountain glacier on a mountain in northern China. As he is transporting the frozen carcas back to the West on the Trans-Siberian express, a weasely collegue/competitor (Cushing) decides to get a look at the find, and inadvertently unleashes a horror that has lain dormant for tens of thousands of years. It quickly becomes apparent that no-one onboard the train is safe as it makes its way across the frozen wilderness....


"Horror Express" is another one of those movies I remember being scared by as a kid. Specifically, the scene where the Kozak leader (played by Telly Savalas(!)) and his men are battling the monster in a darkened traincar. This is one of those films that is exactly as scary as I remember it!

A bit slow-moving at times, "Horror Express" still provides plenty of chills and shocks... and even a couple of unexpected plot-twists. The lighting, camera-work, and special effects all help underscore the growing tension in the film--even if some of the FXs are a bit cheesy--and the actors are all very good, despite the fact that this is one of those international European production where a dozen different languages were being spoken on the set. Lee and Cushing in particular shine; I think this movie features some of the better performances given by either one of them.

I think this is a must-see if you're a fan of Cushing, Lee, or the Hammer Films-style of movies.


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Riding the 'Transsiberian' can be deadly

Transsiberian (2008)
Starring: Emily Mortimer, Woody Harrelson, Eduardo Noriega, Kate Mara and Ben Kingsley
Director: Brad Anderson
Rating: Seven of Ten Stars

An American couple (Harrelson and Mortimer) traveling from Shanghai to Moscow by train are befriended by a pair of shady fellow travelers (Mara and Noriega). They are soon trapped in a web of lies and deceit as the wife tries to cover up a murder and her guiless husband befriends a Russian police detective (Kingsley) with secrets of his own.


"Transsiberian" is a well-written, character-driven thriller that when it's at its best will remind you of Alfred Hitchcock greats like "Blackmail" and "The Lady Vanishes". It's a morally complex thriller that will keep you guessing as to what's coming next and that takes full advantage of both the cramped quarters of the Trans-Siberian Express, the forgotten, crumbling Russian towns it stops at, and of the icy expanse of Siberia in winter, a place that seems more confining than the train cars because, despite the vast empty spaces, there is nowhere to escape to.

Unfortunately, when it's at its worst, it will bore you or have you shaking your head at the nonsense you're expected to buy into.

Basically, the film is a little too slow in getting started. It's great that director/co-writer Brad Anderson takes some time to establish the people on the train and the atmosphere of Siberia, but he does it over and over and over to the point where it starts feeling like he's attempting to pad the film's running time. And, as it builds to its conclusion and every character's true nature is revealed, the film swerves into action movie territory of a like that would have been more at home in a Paramount-released "Bulldog Drummond"-type adventure (just to stay with my comparing of this movie to than the Hitchcockian drama that we have here). The ultimate defeat of the bad guys is also a little deus ex machina in nature, but it was set up earlier in the film so it could have been worse.

The material sandwiched between the slow beginning and over-the-top ending is, however, very good. The actors all do excellent jobs at bringing the characters to three-dimensional life, something which the script supports them in by giving each character their own voice and unique nature. Woody Harrelson is better in this film than I think I've ever seen him. Also, I've not seen sequences featuring a character who killed in self-defense and who is now trying to escape the crime since Hitchcock's "Blackmail", and a lot of that can be credited to Emily Mortimer's performance as Jessie.

If you're a fan of Hitchcock-type thrillers, you should check it out. Just be patient with the beginning.

The past comes a'slashing on the 'Terror Train'

Terror Train (1980)
Staring: Jamie Lee Curtis, Ben Johnson, Hart Bochner, David Copperfield, and Derek McKinnon
Director: Roger Spottiswoode
Rating: Seven of Ten Stars

On New Year's Eve, a murderer is stalking and killing a group of college students onboard a moving train that's host to a costume party. As the victim's pile up, Alana (Curtis) discovers the link between them... and realizes that she is likely to be next.


"Terror Train" is a cross between "Murder on the Orient Express" and "Halloween" (the original... not the turdish 2007 remake). It's got a great setting from which a host of possible victims can't escape, it's got gory kills, and it's got a killer who is moving freely among his (or her) unsuspecting victims, and the killer's identity is even one that be puzzled out by an attentive viewer before the characters realize it, so it's a movie that plays fair like any good mystery does. It's a film that should please those who like lots of suspense and mystery in their slasher-movies, although there are a couple of gory moments to keep the other half happy, as well. (Like most early--and superior--slasher-films, however, most of killing happens off-screen and is left mostly to the imagination of the audience).

Three primary elements combine to make this film the successful thriller that it is.

First, it features some great acting and sound design. The way the actors occassionally sway while moving through the train hallways and the everpresent train-sounds lend a great deal of believability to the film, more than is found in many movies set on trains where little details like uneven and constant motion beneath the actors' feet is often forgotten by sloppy directors.

Second, it features some fine performances by actors who are working with a meaty script. Ben Johnson as the firm-handed train conductor, and Jamie Lee Curtis as yet another "Survivor Girl" (to borrow a bit of terminology from "Behind the Mask") both get to fight the mad killer and be heroes. Curtis also gives what I feel is her best performance in any of her early films, including "Halloween" and "Halloween II". She's also positively gorgeous to look at throughout the movie. Hart Bochner also takes a turn as a truly dispicable character whom the viewer is almost glad to see get his.

Finally, the film features some great lighting and even better cinematography. These help to make the train set seem more real, but they also play a big part in making it frightening and in making help seem very far away when characters are confronted by the killer, even if it might be just a few yards along in the next train car.

Although rumor has it that director Roger Spottiswoode is embarrassed over having made this movie, I think "Terror Train" is an underappreciated movie that is worth seeking out.