Run Time: 88 minutes
Director: Eugenio Martin
Starring: Christopher Lee,
Peter Cushing, Telly Savalas
Horror Express – ah yes, another horror movie I
remember from my childhood. Not until
recently did I see the entire thing, but snippets of visual imagery I certainly
remember: the red, glowing eyes of the monster; the blank, white eyes of its
victims; the red fingernail polish under the eyes, nose, and mouth of each
victim (this is what passes for blood, but it sure as hell looks like polish
applied with a fingernail brush).
Two English scientists, a Russian count and countess, a
crazy-ass Eastern Orthodox priest, a mentally deranged Cossack, and a monster
that looks like a piece of shit. No, I’m
not talking about the design or construction of the monster costume. I mean the monster looks like it was literally made out of shit…a shit monster, if you
will. Now I didn’t start to envision it
that way until after I saw the movie, so I guess I spoiled it for you. But don’t let this dissuade you from seeing Horror Express, because it’s a pretty
good and even suspenseful B-movie. And,
despite the fact that the monster looks like absolutely the world’s largest
bowel movement fully formed in the shape of a man, it is otherwise a genuinely
frightening creature. But then again,
who wants to die at the hands of a biped composed of animate fecal matter?; in
that sense, a shit monster might legitimately be considered a genuinely
frightening creature – it might even scare the living shit out of you...sorry. Still, while I stand by my assessment that
the creature is scary, the scariest piece of shit you are ever likely to see, there
is no denying that is most resembles a giant turd.
When we first see the Turd Who Walks, he is frozen solid in a
block of ice in a cave in Manchuria, where he is discovered by Professor
Alexander Saxton (the great Christopher Lee).
Saxton believes he may have found the missing link in this two million
year-old creature, which looks like nothing I’ve ever seen before (well, again,
that’s not entirely true, but I want to
try to move away from that image). Lee,
in voiceover narration, dictates a letter to the Royal Geological Society,
where he explains that the expedition in Manchuria ended in tragedy. And then we never hear another fucking word
about it.
Or are we supposed to assume the expedition includes the
transport across Siberia from China to Moscow, which occurs during the train
ride that consumes the rest of the movie’s running time? The expedition in Manchuria doesn’t end in tragedy as far as we can
see. The shit that could be described as
tragic doesn’t start to hit the fan until just before the train ride. Which
is a fucking train ride, not an expedition.
He should have said, the Trans-Siberian Express train ride ended in tragedy.
Whatever…
But before we even hear Lee or see the scene in the ice in
Siberia, we hear the theme song over the opening credits. The theme song sounds like an eerier version
of something Ennio Morricone might have written for one of Sergio Leone’s
spaghetti westerns. The interesting
thing about this theme is the fact that you will hear more than one person
either play or whistle the theme during the movie. That doesn’t make a damn bit of sense to
me. Not only that, they whistle or play
it as if it had some sort of intrinsic significance to the plot of the movie
itself. That also doesn’t make a damn bit of sense. Is this the monster’s mantra? Maybe…
Well, no sooner is the thing all crated upon and ready for
shipment via train, than it kills a thief right there in the train terminal. He gets the white eye-fingernail polish
treatment, too. Everybody makes a fuss
and then a wildly overacting Alberto de Mendoza, playing Father Pujardov, the
Eastern Orthodox priest (and the personal family priest of the Russian couple),
starts spouting off about evil and Satan and how the thing in the crate is evil
and satanic. Man, he is sooo adamant, I
think we’re talking Eeeviiil with a capital E here. He makes a cross on the
ground with a piece of chalk and then tries to do the same on the crate, but it
doesn’t adhere. Later, this will be
pointed out to Prof. Saxton (I mean the fact that the chalk could not write on
the box) as evidence of its evil nature.
He poo-poos this and says there could be a reasonable explanation for
the chalk not appearing. Hell, yeah,
there is, and it’s called, “Maybe the priest was faking it and didn’t really
touch the chalk to the crate!”
Anyway before all this, Saxton meets up with a Dr. Wells
(played by the incomparable Peter Cushing), for whom it is clear he feels a bit
of antipathy initially. Well, everybody
gets loaded up and off we go on the Trans-Siberian Express! The crate with the shit monster in it gets
loaded up and Dr. Wells bribes one of the attendants to sneak a peak in there
because Professor Saxton is being quite coy about its contents. Uh-oh…as we all know, that spells doom for
the poor attendant, who also gets the “white eye, blood from the orifices
hoo-doo” from the monster’s glowing red eyes.
The next thing we know, the attendant is missing and the
detective aboard orders Prof. Saxton to open the crate. So, what does he do? By God, he throws the key out the
window. Well, there’s only a fucking
padlock and a chain on the damned thing to begin with, so the detective, in
grand, “Oh yeah, asshole, I’ll show you!” fashion, simply orders one of the
other attendants to take an axe to the lock.
Except inside the crate is the missing attendant, but no shit
monster.
It is right around this time that someone, I don’t remember
who, asks Prof. Saxton if he thinks it’s his
shit monster running around killing everyone.
He says yes. What? Let’s think about this a minute. At this early a juncture, wouldn’t it be much
more likely that someone else killed the attendant and stole the shit monster because he thought it might be valuable than
to believe that a two million year-old stool sample has suddenly come to life
and is walking the earth again? Oh,
well.
Next up, the monster kills a mysterious woman with a past
(the folks aboard are caricatures out of Murder on the Orient Express;
in fact, we could call this movie by that title). You will remember her as the woman who
petitioned for help from Dr. Wells earlier in the movie. The monster sneaks up and puts a bear hug on
her and gives her the stare of deathly horror, whereupon she, too, dies of the
white-eyed heeby-jeebies. When he
catches her, she is trying to steal something from a safe in the hold where the
goodies are stored.
Someone later tells the train detective (I don’t remember his
name) that the victim was a spy. And he
knows this, how? Anyway, the detective
answers, “Yes, I know.” Well, Mr.
fucking Train Detective, if you knew that, why didn’t you do something about it
earlier? Exasperating, man.
Right after the spy’s murder, Dr. Wells is snooping around (he’s
a nosy old bastard) in the hold and gets his arm grabbed by the monster. Thankfully the detective is there in time to
shoot the shit (sorry)…shoot the monster, that is. Now, you wouldn’t really think bullets could
harm organic waste matter, but thank God it does. No more shit monster.
Wells and Saxton team up at this point to try to figure out
what the hell is going on. They put some
of the viscous fluid from the monster’s eye under a microscope and see some
incredible images of dinosaurs and other exotic objects, including a view of
the earth from space. It turns out we’re
dealing with an ancient alien here, whose eyes are the windows not of its soul,
I think, but which are the seat of its intellect. I don’t think it necessary to divulge any
more of the plot, for to do so will only ruin the rest of the movie. But, let me say this: you will miss the shit
monster.
I’ve made fun of the film, but it’s really a lot of fun and it’s
well-made, given what I’m sure was a
limited budget. The monster is actually
really creepy scary…he’s bigger than shit, too…I can’t help myself. It’s well-acted by everyone, even de Mendoza
and Telly Savalas, whose overacting is so bombastic as to add more than it
detracts from the action. The alien idea
and the theme involving eyes is very interesting, too. It’s similar in some key respects to
Carpenter’s The Thing, (closer to
the source novella, “Who Goes There?” than the Nyby/Hawks original from 1951). I wonder if the screenwriters and the man
responsible for the original idea were familiar with James Campbell’s work.
I will admit that nostalgia strengthens my affection for
movies I might otherwise not be too fond of.
I love all of the Hammer Dracula films equally, largely because they all
have Chris Lee in them. I can’t bring
myself to find much fault with the Universal creature features of the 30s &
40s, even when they changed from prestige pics to B-movie fare. So my memories of those glaring eyes, red as
coal, informs my opinion of its value after all these years. As I age and begin to feel more insistently
the pull of the way I remember the events of my past, I cling even more to
these cheesy old horror movies that formed a part of it. I cannot help myself.
RANDOM THOUGHTS
I have read a story concerning how Christopher Lee encouraged
Cushing to commit to the film that, if true, is a poignant one. Filming began as Cushing was still grieving
the loss of his wife to cancer, a shattering blow to the actor. I’ve read elsewhere about the astonishingly
visible transformation his appearance underwent in the time between the last
two Hammer Dracula pictures; I had honestly not noticed. Always an extremely thin man, he became
emaciated. I guess I had noticed without knowing what to
attribute it to; I’m sorry that it was grief.
The Horror Inkwell Rating: 6/10
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