Day 20: The Midnight Meat Train (2008)

I saw the trailer for this back in 2008, and was mildly interested in seeing it, but as it never appeared in any local movie theater I quickly forgot about it. Later that year in one of my film classes, we had a representative from OFRB (Ontario Film Review Board) come talk to us about the rating system, how it works, how they rate films and so forth. She happened to mention that they had just given out their first R rating to a non-adult film since the division of the higher end ratings into either R or 18A (all films up to that point getting the later). She asked if anyone could guess the film, and no one could, and see then said it was The Midnight Meat Train, and it seemed like I was one of the only people in the room who had heard of it. This explained why I had not seen it in the local theaters - R rated films are a harder sell since 18A since you have to be over 18 to see R rater films. The fact that this was the first film in Ontario to garnish the elusive R rating basically confirmed that I had to see it. How much worse could it be then the Saw films or the Hostel films, all of which gained the 18A rating?

That's a good question. I'm not particularly sure what pushed this over the edge from 18A to R. While there were indeed some graphic scenes of violence, nothing particularly offended me or seemed worse then other films.

It's a horror film about a serial killer who murders people on the late subway train, and a photographer stumbles on to him and attempts to uncover his identity. Basic horror film premise, but with a refreshing take on the genre. I'm somewhat shocked this hasn't garnished a wider mass appeal. It was more entertaining than most horror films, has good actors - Bradely Cooper, Leslie Bibb, and Vinnie Jones - and it's plot doesn't fall apart in the first half the film, and actually saves the most dramatic segment of the film for the last 5 minutes. While it clearly left room for a sequel, it seems unlikely that one is going to happen with the less than stellar success of this one. Not sure what else to say; I enjoyed it and horror fans probably would to.