Review: Horror Express

Filmed in Spain, this oddball flick set in 1906 has pompous and impatient anthropologist Christopher Lee apparently finding the ‘missing link’ and transporting this ‘fossil’ on the Trans-Siberian Express to China. Not surprisingly to anyone who has seen a genre movie before, the ape-man thaws and starts picking off passengers. The ape-man appears to have weird, otherworldly powers and proves a dangerous foe for Lee and his fellow doctor Peter Cushing. Telly Savalas turns up at the 11th hour to have fun chewing scenery as a blustering Russian Cossack officer trying to make sense of everything.

 

Cheaply made, extremely silly, this 1973 Eugenio Martin (“Nightmare Inn”) horror-sci-fi flick is entertaining nonetheless. This is especially so for fans of Lee, who for once has the larger part than his frequent co-star Cushing. I will never tire of watching Lee failing to suffer fools. Cushing is fine, but his character is far less interesting. He does get the film’s best/worst line however: ‘Monster? We’re British you know!’. Kudos for the whole “Nicholas and Alexandria” subplot, featuring leftover sets (and model trains) from that film and even including a Rasputin-like character, who is hilarious (It’s also interesting to compare Alberto de Mendoza’s interesting interpretation of that sort of character to Lee’s own version in “Rasputin-The Mad Monk”).

 

There’s a weird spaghetti western vibe here despite being a sci-fi horror film set in Russia and China. Savalas’s entrance and some of the music in particular gave me the impression of a spaghetti western. The film definitely livens up and gets seriously weird when Telly arrives. Although pretty dumb, the central idea is still fascinating and despite the budget some of the images are still creepy. In particular seeing people with whitened eyes with blood dripping out of them. Yes, the science is nonsense here but it’s interesting nonsense. Less impressive is the whole laser eye thing with the creature. The creature suit isn’t the greatest, but the laser eye just baffles me.

 

Good cheesy fun, if no world-beater. The screenplay is by Martin, Arnaud D’Usseau (“Psychomania”), and Julian Halevy (“Circus World”, “Custer of the West”, “Psychomania”) from a short story by Gene Martin. Call it “Horror on the Trans-Siberian Express”, perhaps?

 

Rating: B-

 

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