NIGHT TRAIN MURDERS (or any of the other half dozen titles it's been released under) is a solid, suspenseful thriller which was inspired, by the filmmakers' own admission, by Wes Craven's LAST HOUSE ON THE LEFT.
Two young girls, on the way to Italy to spend Christmas with one girl's parents, find themselves trapped in a train compartment with a sadistic upper class woman and two low-life thugs, who perform various humiliating and cruel acts on them. Meanwhile, at the younger, virginal girl's parents' villa, a Christmas party is taking place, and the parents are blissfully unaware of the girls' predicament.
SPOILERS
The finale, in which the threesome wind up at the parents' house during which time the parents discover who they are and enact bloody revenge, is lifted right out of LAST HOUSE. There are some interesting differences in the torture sequences, however.
Firstly, the threesome only kill one of the girls, and accidentally at that.
Frustrated by his inability to break the virginal girl's hymen while attempting to rape her, the heroin-addicted thug attempts to cut it open with his knife. When he hesitates, the woman shoves the knife in herself, causing the girl to hemorrhage and bleed to death. It is one of the more harrowing and disturbing acts of sexual violence I've seen depicted on film.
The other girl (played by Irene Miracle, who would go on to star in Dario Argento's INFERNO and Alan Parker's MIDNIGHT EXPRESS) quietly accepts her abuse in order to protect herself. She even allows herself to be raped by a peeping tom, who is invited into the compartment by the threesome.
Her death is quite a surprise, as she attempts to flee and is pursued by the two thugs. Eventually she locks herself in the lavatory, and climbs out the window and flings herself to her death as the duo try to break in. He death is almost a mirror image of Sandra Cassel's death in LAST HOUSE. While Cassel finally gives in to her fate and allows herself to be shot down, Miracle refuses to allow herself to be killed by her attackers, choosing to take her own life instead.
Miracle, whose first movie role this was, proves to be a real trooper, spending her final fifteen minutes of screen time with no pants or underwear on, including the scenes in which she is chased and leaps off the train. Her exposed lower half helps to hit home the level of both the violation that has been inflicted upon her, as well as her desperation in escaping, as she never even seems to notice she's nude from the waist down. In a more Hollywood-ized movie, her character would have taken the time to cover herself.
The killers' horror at having killed the one girl, as well as their shock in seeing Miracle fling herself onto the rocks by the track shows that they are by no means killers, but mischievous crooks who have taken things too far. This reflects the killers' brief disgust at their own actions in LAST HOUSE, but the difference is that in LAST HOUSE the gang are killers by nature, whereas in NIGHT TRAIN MURDERS, they are not.
I felt more sympathy toward the thugs here when the father brutally kills them both, then in LAST HOUSE. The death of the heroin-addicted thug is excruciating, as he is repeatedly stabbed, slashed and beaten to a pulp. After the other has been pursued and killed like a wild animal with a shotgun, the upper class lady, who has orchestrated the whole ordeal, convinces the father she was at the mercy of the pair of thugs, and winds up getting away with her crimes.
On its own, NIGHT TRAIN MURDERS is a well-paced, intense and atmospheric thriller. It has giallo overtones, but also has a gritty realism that clashes with the more surreal stylization. Recommended for fans of grindhouse and exploitation movies.
Two young girls, on the way to Italy to spend Christmas with one girl's parents, find themselves trapped in a train compartment with a sadistic upper class woman and two low-life thugs, who perform various humiliating and cruel acts on them. Meanwhile, at the younger, virginal girl's parents' villa, a Christmas party is taking place, and the parents are blissfully unaware of the girls' predicament.
SPOILERS
The finale, in which the threesome wind up at the parents' house during which time the parents discover who they are and enact bloody revenge, is lifted right out of LAST HOUSE. There are some interesting differences in the torture sequences, however.
Firstly, the threesome only kill one of the girls, and accidentally at that.
Frustrated by his inability to break the virginal girl's hymen while attempting to rape her, the heroin-addicted thug attempts to cut it open with his knife. When he hesitates, the woman shoves the knife in herself, causing the girl to hemorrhage and bleed to death. It is one of the more harrowing and disturbing acts of sexual violence I've seen depicted on film.
The other girl (played by Irene Miracle, who would go on to star in Dario Argento's INFERNO and Alan Parker's MIDNIGHT EXPRESS) quietly accepts her abuse in order to protect herself. She even allows herself to be raped by a peeping tom, who is invited into the compartment by the threesome.
Her death is quite a surprise, as she attempts to flee and is pursued by the two thugs. Eventually she locks herself in the lavatory, and climbs out the window and flings herself to her death as the duo try to break in. He death is almost a mirror image of Sandra Cassel's death in LAST HOUSE. While Cassel finally gives in to her fate and allows herself to be shot down, Miracle refuses to allow herself to be killed by her attackers, choosing to take her own life instead.
Miracle, whose first movie role this was, proves to be a real trooper, spending her final fifteen minutes of screen time with no pants or underwear on, including the scenes in which she is chased and leaps off the train. Her exposed lower half helps to hit home the level of both the violation that has been inflicted upon her, as well as her desperation in escaping, as she never even seems to notice she's nude from the waist down. In a more Hollywood-ized movie, her character would have taken the time to cover herself.
The killers' horror at having killed the one girl, as well as their shock in seeing Miracle fling herself onto the rocks by the track shows that they are by no means killers, but mischievous crooks who have taken things too far. This reflects the killers' brief disgust at their own actions in LAST HOUSE, but the difference is that in LAST HOUSE the gang are killers by nature, whereas in NIGHT TRAIN MURDERS, they are not.
I felt more sympathy toward the thugs here when the father brutally kills them both, then in LAST HOUSE. The death of the heroin-addicted thug is excruciating, as he is repeatedly stabbed, slashed and beaten to a pulp. After the other has been pursued and killed like a wild animal with a shotgun, the upper class lady, who has orchestrated the whole ordeal, convinces the father she was at the mercy of the pair of thugs, and winds up getting away with her crimes.
On its own, NIGHT TRAIN MURDERS is a well-paced, intense and atmospheric thriller. It has giallo overtones, but also has a gritty realism that clashes with the more surreal stylization. Recommended for fans of grindhouse and exploitation movies.