Terror Train
Tags: grindhouse film, murder, cult, horror, violence, revenge, sadist, prank

Plot synopsis:
A large group of college students are at a bonfire for the New Year's Eve celebration. All of the pledges are wearing beanies, and one nerd-ish pledge named Kenny (Derek McKinnon) is sent by the fraternity president Doc (Hart Bochner) and his friends up to a room in the frat house where a sorority sister named Alana (Jamie Lee Curtis) is waiting in the doorway. Alana walks inside the bedroom and stands behind the canopy in the dark room. Kenny undressed, sits in bed, and realizes that he is sitting beside a bloated and rotting corpse. Kenny screams in terror and he stands up on the bed and is caught up in the canopy. Alana seems repulsed as Doc and a group of other students rush in and laugh at Kenny.Three years later. A large group of college kids are exiting a bus at a train station. They have a toast celebrating four great years at college as they prepare to board a charted old train for a New Year's Eve costume party. Carne (Ben Johnson), the lead conductor, has the students board the train while he organizes the route with the dispatcher. Carne helps a magician (David Copperfield) and his assistant carry their luggage on board, as a three-person band board the train for the excursion.Nearby, Ed (Howard Busgang) a prankster student and one of the ones involved in the prank against Kenny, walks around with a sword through his stomach. The other students laugh and think its another one of his practical jokes, but he falls down after the people walk away and board the train. An unseen person takes Ed's Groucho Marx costume and rolls his dead body under the train tracks. The train leaves and the lights at the deserted station are turned off. The killer is wearing Ed's costume as he moves around the train.Meanwhile, Mitchy (Sandee Currie) another one of the students involved in the prank against Kenny, is talking to Alana who is graduating early and hopes they will keep in touch.In the back of the train, the magician is talking to his blond assistant about the rowdy college kids and complaining about having to perform his illusions in front of them.In the lounge car, Doc is celebrating with his fellow frat brothers when one of them asks about the now abolished "hog night" and he mentions that something bad happened. Alana enters and tells them that they "put a kid in the hospital" who had a nervous breakdown due to Doc's prank three years ago. Alana then goes to her boyfriend Mo, also involved in the prank against Kenny, where they retire for some alone time.A little later, Mitchy sees 'Ed' and he follows her towards the sleeping berths. He nearly grabs her when Jackson, another of the students involved in the prank against Kenny, appears. Jackson is very inebriated and he offers 'Ed' a drink. In the nearby lavatory, the killer grabs Jackson, lifts up his mask for a second to let him see his face, and slams Jackson's head into the mirror. The killer then changes out of his Groucho Marx costume and leaves the lavatory.Meanwhile, Alana becomes angry when learning that the train party was Doc's idea after Mo told her that it was his. Two of the sorority sisters, Pet and Merry, show up where Pet thinks that her boyfriend, Ed, missed the train, and Alana argues with Mo about learning that Doc had set him up again. Carne, the conductor, shows Doc and Mitchy a car trick he learned form the magician (it is only a gag), and the couple waits for the occupied bathroom. After a few minutes, they leave to find another one.Later, the magician performs his show before the students and afterwards, the rock band appears to play. Alana talks with the geekish class president (who was a pledge in the opening scene). Meanwhile, Doc asks Mo where Jackson and Ed are. Mo does not know and when he asks where did he find the magician, Doc says that he did not hire a magician for the party and wonders who did.Alana tells Carne that someone may have been left behind, but Carne tells her that the train platform was empty when he viewed it prior to the train leaving. Mitchy hears this and tells them that she saw Ed earlier on the train. Frustrated at being unable to find their boyfriends Jackson and Ed, Merry and Pet approach Doc and Mo who offer to take them to "consulting rooms" as they are both med students.Carne goes off to have a talk with Walter, the engineer of the train, and the stoker, nicknamed Shovels, to ask for the time to reach their destination. Carne then tries his card gag on Charlie, the brake master, who does not understand the joke.Afterwards, Carne then goes to the locked door of the lavatory and knocks on it, asking if there is anyone inside for it has been locked for some time. He unlocks it with his master key and finds a dead Jackson lying on the floor, with blood everywhere. Carne checks and sees that his neck must have been slashed and he quietly locks it again. Carne then tells Walter and Charlie what he found saying "there's a boy dead back there". After looking at a map of the area, they agree that the closest way out is straight ahead as the train is moving though rural and unpopulated wooded areas.Back in the showroom car, Mitchy mentions to Alana on the dance floor that she is leaving to be with Doc, and the magician, after looking at Alana, leaves in the same direction at Mitchy.Charlie arrives at the locked door to the lavatory and tells some girls passing by that it is out of order. Carne opens the door for him and the blood is gone and 'Jackson', wearing his alligator costume, is down on the floor moving. Carne thinks it was a practical joke and Mitchy walks by and leads 'Jackson' away.In Doc and Mo's room, Merry points out Kenny's photo in a yearbook. When Mo mentions about Kenny having a nervous breakdown, Doc yells at Mo not to talk about it, and Pet motions for Doc to keep quiet. Doc and Merry leave Mo alone with Pet.At the same time, Mitchy is with the killer still wearing Jackson's alligator costume, unaware of who it really is. Mitchy beckons him to join her in a berth bed as Merry and Doc walk by. Mitchy leans down and asks 'Jackson' to have her way with her. The killer takes off a glove and lays a hand on Mitchy's chest. She looks down and sees that it is Jackson's severed hand. She tries to scream, but the killer puts his real hand over her mouth.A little later, the magician approaches Alana and asks if she enjoyed his show, and he tries to woo her with more illusions such as the cigarette-through-a-quarter trick, and a levitating rose. Doc sees this and interrupts the conversation to tell Alana that Mo is waiting for her. Doc, for some reason, is not friendly towards the magician.Meanwhile, Carne finds one of Mitchy's shoes on the floor in the sleeping quarters and then finds Mitchy dead with her throat slit in one of the beds. He runs into Alana and asks her whose shoe he has. She goes to get Mo, but he ignores the knocking at his door for a rambunctious Pet is there with him. Carne gets Alana alone in the conductor car and tells her that Mitchy is dead and he shows her the body.The magician puts on a second show where he asks Merry to volunteer for some of his illusions. Doc continues acting in a rude tone around the magician and outright expresses skepticism to the show. After a few minutes, Doc sees Mo hanging his head out of apparent boredom and follows suit. When the magic show ends, Mo does not move or talk, and when Doc hits him, he falls over. Doc takes a closer look at Mo and sees that he is not breathing. Doc's screams for help are ignored by the crowd as they cheer for the magician and his assistant. Doc carries Mo through the train to Carne and Alana and they discover a large stab wound on his chest. Mo is dead.Finally aware that there may be a maniac killer on board the train, Carne checks the lavatory and discovers a bloodied rag that the killer used to clean up the mess after killing Jackson. Carne runs up to the engine room only to find Walter and Shovels both gone (only finding a bloody engineer's cap). Carne and Charlie pull the emergency breaks and, after a tense minute, stops the train. Carne leads the students off the train as he has the chief porter and several of his men look around the train for the killer. Outside, Carne has everyone take off their masks to get a look at all of them as the class president takes a roll call to see who is present.Alana suggests to Doc that the killer might be Kenny wanting to get back at all those involved in the prank against him three years earlier. She tells Doc that after the practical joke with the corpse, Kenny was taken away and when she went to the hospital psych ward later that night to visit him to apologize for the prank, the hospital staff would not let her see Kenny for he was kept in isolation because he had killed someone in the hospital after he was admitted. Doc thinks that with Ed, Jackson, Mo, and Mitchy dead, they are the only two ones left involved in the prank and they might be next.Doc takes Alana to a room and locks the doors. He shows her a yearbook and she sees that Kenny used to be a magician in high school. Alana wants to tell Carne about Kenny, but Doc refuses to let her leave. She gets out of the room and runs when a figure wielding an axe approaches her. But it is only Charlie the break master who tells her to go back outside with the others.Alone in the room, Doc checks every inch of the room from the lockers to the above berths. He sits down and then realizes that he forgot to check under the seats. He stands up and is grabbed by someone under his seat. He tries to escape, but a hand grabs his shoulder. He looks at the hand which has painted black fingernails and Mitchy's class ring. He settles down beliving that Mitchy is joking with him. But the killer pulls out a knife and puts it to his neck and slashes his throat.Carne takes the students back onto the train and has them all packed into the dining room car to sort out who the killer is. With no phone or radio and no roads around, they will have to travel to their destination to find help. Meanwhile, the magician's assistant arrives back in the showroom car and tells him about a killer lurking among them, and he scolds her for wondering around and going outside.As Carne has Charlie restart the train and as it gets underway again, Alana runs up to him and tells him that she thinks the killer is the magician. They go to get Doc, and Carne enters the dark cabin room to find it splattered with blood and he finds Doc with his head cut off in one of the berths.Carne assembles a small group of train porters who arm themselves with fire axes and crowbars. They quietly enter the magician's showroom car where they herd his assistant and all of the students out, and lock the door. The chief porter takes Alana to a compartment and offers to look after her while she rests. Having assembled all of the students into the tightly packed dining room car, Carne and his men enter the showroom car, but the magician is nowhere to be found.In the rooms compartment, the chief porter is sitting dead in a chair, having been stabbed with one of the magician's swords. The killer is now wearing Mitchy's black robe and old man's mask costume and, taking the axe off the dead porter, quietly enters Alana's room and swings the axe at the covers, but it is only an inflatable doll. Alana, anticipating the killer would do just that, jumps out of a closet and stabs the killer in the shoulder with a sword. But the killer gets back up and chases her to the conductors car, but loses his axe when he swings and misses Alana and it flies out a window. Deprived of his weapon, the killer and Alana struggle with him trying to choke Alana. Alana sprays the killer with a fire extinguisher and takes refuge in a caged area with a desk. She locks herself in, and the killer arms himself with a crowbar and knocks out all the lights in the compartment and attempts to pry the lock. But Alana stabs him in the face with a letter opener, kicks the door open and runs out. The killer chases Alana and, during another struggle, falls between the train cars. Carne and his men arrive and leads the wounded and shaken Alana away, unaware that the killer is holding onto the side of the train car.Later, as dawn begins to break, Alana sits alone in the back of the train in the show room and upon looking at the magician's folder and paperwork, finds the magician dead in a box, impaled with his swords. Alana screams, and runs out past the students and goes forward to the conductors compartment at the front of the train to find Carne and sees Charlie sitting at his desk. She tells him that the magician is dead and doesn't know who the killer is anymore. But the figure grabs her hands and she looks up and sees a masked person wearing Charlie's uniform. The killer has obviously killed Charlie, removed his uniform, and threw his body off the train for the side car door is slightly open. Alana asks the killer who he is, and he removes his mask, revealing a pasty white-faced Kenny (complete with a wound to his left cheek where she stabbed him earlier). Kenny then takes off his cap, revealing.... flowing blond hair (Kenny was the magician's female assistant). Kenny takes off his blond wig, removes his false teeth and wipes off his lipstick and white powder makeup. Alana tries to apologize to Kenny for her involvement in the prank, but he tells her that he always had a crush on her. He tells her to kiss him for he feels that Alana owes him just that for the past three years, and she reluctantly obeys. Suddenly, Kenny has a similar eerie reaction as the memory of the practical joke with the corpse comes right back to him. Alana backs away and Carne enters from the engine room with a shovel and sees Kenny reacting to his encounter with Alana. Carne hits Kenny with the shovel, and he falls out of the moving train though the open side door while it is passing a bridge. Kenny falls hundreds of feet and lands in an icy river far below as the train continues moving on.

Review: And as with HALLOWEEN and THE FOG, the heroine at the center of this is none other than Jamie Lee Curtis.But unlike most HALLOWEEN-inspired bloodfests, TERROR TRAIN does boast a lot of good things to lift it above the worst of an always-bad bunch.
Furthermore, the violence and bloodshed are surprisingly kept relatively down; and while the revelation of who the killer is may not in and of itself be so surprising, it does give the opportunity for both Johnson and Curtis to be heroes.TERROR TRAIN may not be everyone's cup of tea (and it doesn't really compare to HALLOWEEN); but for those willing to take a spooky ride, it is well worth it..
And I also loved the fact that the killer uses different costumes for each murder, pure genius.The only draw back on this movie is that most of the murders happen off-screen, but more than makes up for it in the performances like Derek MacKinnion who plays Kenny a very well rounded performance, Ben Johnston does well in his role as the train conducter and even real life magician David Copperfield plays his part well.
The train chief (Ben Johnson) will try to track down the killer among the numerous students (Jamie Lee Curtis, Hart Bochner , D.D.Winters : Vanity).
"Terror Train" is a competent looking slasher by director Roger Spottiswoode, but here we go again in the formulaic stakes, which isn't too bad because it's slickly done with a different and claustrophobic setting.
Spottiswoode's capable direction keeps the film level with some flair and the performances by the always watchable Jamie Lee Curtis (who just reprises her signature scream queen role) and Ben Johnson is decent in a minor sense.
The rest of the performances are forgettable with the usual cheeky, drunken frats and you got the stiff looking David Copperfield."Terror Train" is a modest slasher affair all round that at times is a bit too convenient, but while there are some restrictions it still mildly entertains..
"Terror Train" is the final Jamie Lee Curtis horror movie (not including the "Halloween" sequels) and it certainly is a high note to go out on.
The film doesn't have the substance and art that "Halloween" or "The Fog", but one might find that "Terror Train" is an above average slasher film that, like its fellow Curtis movies, relies more on story and thrills than blood and guts.
This movie truly puts others like "Prom Night", "My Bloody Valentine", "Madman", "Happy Birthday to Me", and "Graduation Day" to shame, and one could easily argue that its better than the extremely popular "Friday the 13th" films."Terror Train" is a little more complicated than most slasher fares.
Jamie Lee Curtis is pretty much playing yet another heroine in a horror movie, and her performance is stellar but nothing special."Terror Train" is a great slasher film recommended for slasher fans.
The college students Doc (Hart Bochner), Michelle "Mitchy" (Sandee Currie), Mo (Timothy Webber), Alana (Jamie Lee Curtis), Edward "Ed" (Howard Busgang) and Jackson (Anthony Sherwood) plot a prank for their college mate Kenny Hampson (Derek McKinnon); however the joke goes wrong and Kenny ends up in a mental institution.
"Terror Train" is one of the better entries in the slasher cycle.**SPOILERS**Three years ago, Alaina Maxwell, (Jaime Lee Curtis) humiliates the class nerd in college during a prep rally by accident.
This one's practically bloodless, but there are plenty of thrills and suspense as Curtis and a bunch of her college chums become victims of a vengeful maniac when they have a New Year's Eve costume party on an all-night train ride.
Plus, the killer's identity is a real surprise, because, due to an opening fraternity-hazing scene, you already know his true identity, but you don't know who he's disguised as on the train (and you probably won't be able to guess either.)  Ben Johnson brings some credibility to the cast as the kindly conductor, and David Copperfield gets a lot of screen time as -- big stretch -- a magician.
By now horror fans must have seen umpteenth number of times the story where the killer who is been bullied, comes back for revenge but the only difference here is that the action takes place not in some campus or institution but in a train which has a conductor played by Ben Johnson who doesn't get to shoot with a gun but strike with a shovel.
The film opens with a fraternity party prank gone wrong involving nerdy Kenny Hampson, the too smart for their own good frat boys, and an unwitting Alana Maxwell (Jamie Lee Curtis).
In short, "Terror Train" is a film that was made during the time when slasher pictures still had some quality to them and for that reason, no horror fan should pass up the chance to see it.
She's very good in Terror Train; although it feels like a very similar role to those she portrayed in Halloween and Prom Night, there's something stronger about the character that makes Curtis work standout more.There are some stereotypical college partying scenes and generic characters, but Terror Train is very entertaining.
The basic plot structure is given a clear roadmap in the first 15 minutes: horrible victim of practical joke, party, mass murder, etc., etc..What makes this film worth watching is how the little details end up looking so silly 25 years later.
It doesn't take much of an imagination to predict that an unwanted someone climbs aboard, leaving a jesting merry-maker at the station with a sword through his stomach, stealing his mask and costume before he leaves!Lets face it, any slasher movie with Jamie Lee Curtis at the height of her scream queen period has got an instant advantage above its peers.
Another great thing about "Terror Train" is that it relies on true suspense and good performances for its thrills, not the excessive gore and blood that has hindered most of the slashers of this sort.
The only thing I can think of is that this was part of Jamie Lee Curtis' three film hat trick that earned her the title of the premiere "Scream Queen" of the early 80s (the other two films, of course, are the original "Halloween" and "Prom Night"), and for that it automatically gets a free pass from horror geeks even though the movie itself isn't very good at all.
I'll grant that "Terror Train" has an original setting and a few decent set pieces but the finished product was slow moving, filled with annoying characters and wasn't terribly gory or scary, even by 1980 standards.Our story opens during a college fraternity's New Year's Eve party in which a prank on a pledge (involving a corpse in a bed that he thinks is going to be a real girl) goes horribly wrong and said pledge ends up institutionalized.
After several more (relatively bloodless, offscreen) kills, comes the predictable showdown between J.L.C. and the masked slasher.The problem with "Terror Train" is that even though you'd think a train would be a pretty claustrophobic setting for a horror film, the killer is able to roam freely around the cars, some packed with crowds of people no less, and yet he remains undetected till the middle of the movie, which doesn't seem terribly realistic to me.
A group of med students play a cruel gag on nerdish Kenny Hampton at a New Year's Party where a girl lures Kenny into bed,but leaves him there with a corpse taken from the morgue.The shock sends Kenny insane.Three years later the same group holds a fancy dress party aboard a train that they have chartered for a cross-country trip to celebrate their graduation.However Kenny sneaks aboard in disguise and starts killing off those responsible for the prank."Terror Train" is definitely one of the better slasher flicks from early 80's.There is quite a fair amount of suspense and the characters are well-developed.The photography by John Alcott of "The Shining" fame is truly beautiful-the images of train moving through the haunted snowbound Canadian area are simply awesome.8 out of 10..
A couple of minor plot holes aside, the biggest thing that weighs against 'Terror Train' is a precredits scene that gives away the killer's identity; as such, the film lacks the mystery element of something like 'Friday the 13th', but it is a surprisingly gripping ride even with the murderer and his motivations very obvious from the get-go.
Director: Roger Spottiswoode, Script: T.Y. Drake, Cast: Ben Johnson, Jamie Lee Curtis, David Copperfield Of the mega film franchises to come out of the late 70's and 80's IE: Halloween, Friday the 13th, A Nightmare on Elm Street, this along with Toby Hooper's Funhouse are what I consider to be 'the best of the rest'.
Someone on the train is killing the passengers and wearing the masks of the victims.Great horror slasher film.
I do not understand this because Terror Train is an interesting story with excellent players, headed by 1971 Academy Award winner, (Best Supporting Actor in The Last Picture Show), Ben Johnson as Carne, (the conductor), scream queen Jamie Lee Curtis as Alana, and  David Copperfield as the magician.
But as it happens, the traumatized victim of the prank from the very first scene is back who boards the train and targets the six students involved (Jamie Lee Curtis is one of them) to kill all of them in some nasty ways and then wearing their costumes in order to get closer to his other targets.The train setting the about the only thing original in this horror flick and first time director Roger Spottiswoode makes good use of confining the environment and the fact that not only the killer is wearing a mask, but almost everyone else is too.
But what Spottiswoode can't compensate for is a script that provides unappealing characters, bad dialog, and little in the way of shocks or suspense.Contents: Seven killings (and several disappearances) off-camera mayhem, after-the-fact blood, a severed-head-in-the-upper-berth gag, two seconds of female nudity, a masked psycho, masked victims, lots of train chat, lots of magic tricks (courtesy of David Copperfield in a rare movie appearance), not significantly stupider than usual.
Heading the cast are: Jamie Lee Curtis as the film's heroine; Oscar-winner Ben Johnson as a paternal conductor (Curtis was always paired with father figures during her Scream Queen days: Donald Pleasence in "Halloween" and Leslie Nielsen in "Prom Night"); Hart Bochner as a cruel medical student; and David Copperfield as what else?...a magician!
"Terror Train" is yet another Jamie Lee Curtis/Scream Queen vehicle, and though the action and suspense is nothing new, the ending is quite the surprise.I haven't been this surprised watching a horror movie in a long time.
TERROR TRAIN is a good film it is better than Jamie Lee Curtis's PROM NIGHT.
Like most people I was expecting a rip-off from Halloween, but it actually wasn't.Most people already knew who the killer was, but it was still pretty good especially the last scene with Jamie Lee Curtis and the killer, somewhat suspenseful.
A far cry from the legendary Halloween (I & II) but on par with Prom Night and a heck of a lot better than the Fog, Terror Train is a super slasher film.
Terror train 1980 It start of number of teens getting drunk and having party on new years eve but Then a prank goes wrong I thought prank seen looked a little out dated now ( I wish we saw mire if it )!A fews years have gone by and these same kid's go party train There is a lot of party and talking but I didn't find it had much horror The kiss were far to apart in the movie but we do get see magic person Sone of characters were very moody , for most of the movie There some bloody moments in this movie, will some kills , don't really Get to see Them killed but we did see the after math of Death Even they tired to twist and turn but didn't work me as I knew who the killer was from the middle Lol 5 out of 10.
Jamie Lee Curtis stars as one of many graduating college students who board a train to celebrate, but a killer with a grudge(for a cruel prank used against him four years earlier) disrupts the festivities, as he begins murdering the passengers, and donning their costumes(part of the party) in order to fool them.
In between Halloween and Halloween II, Jamie Lee Curtis did three horror flicks, all in 1980 - The Fog, Prom Night, & Terror Train.After the opening setup where the class nerd (Derek McKinnon) is humiliated by Alana (Jamie Lee Curtis), and three years later a New Year's Eve costume party occurs on a train with the same people involved, we know what is going to happen.All that is left is to see if this is a slasher flick worth our time.Oscar winner Ben Johnson (The Last Picture Show) is the train's conductor.
Terror Train does start off a little slow, most horror movies have a kill scene in the first 5 minutes, not this one, they set up the prank in the first few minutes, at first i thought i was in for a really bad horror film, but was i wrong.
Terror Train is full of suspense and even a good scare, if you like 80's horror this one is for you, and i must say once again Jamie Lee Curtis was great in this.
The murder set-pieces deliver the goods (the ruse of having the killer take up the disguise of each victim, at least, is an interesting one), even if none is especially memorable; the best thing about it is certainly John Alcott's gleaming cinematography (a surprise choice for this type of film, unless the film-makers hoped that his contribution would make the confined train setting as characteristic - and alive - as the Overlook Hotel had been rendered in Stanley Kubrick's THE SHINING [1980] but, if that was the case, their plan backfired).While it's always nice to watch veteran character actor Ben Johnson, his top billing is misleading (as is the poster of the film, in which the killer is disguised as the train conductor, though I understand how that may have been done figuratively) because his role is not especially significant; Jamie Lee Curtis is the real star of the film but her role is not as well-rounded as her Laurie Strode in the original HALLOWEEN (1978).
Even though this was Roger Spottiswoode's first ever directed movie, the movie looks and feels like it got made by a genre expert, who had been in the business for at least a decade already.It's a typical slasher that is basically about a killer killing the one after the other med-student, who are celebrating new years eve on a train.
Directed by Roger Spottiswoode (who would later achieve bigger things with Bond movie Tomorrow Never Dies), Terror Train stars 'scream-queen du jour' Jamie Lee Curtis as Alana Maxwell, a New Year's Eve reveller at a fancy dress party taking place on board a steam locomotive.
Jamie Lee Curtis After Her Pervious "Scream Queen" Roles "PROM NIGHT" And Two Of John Carpenter's Films "THE FOG" And "HALLOWEEN" Now Delivers Another Stronger Female Lead Performance Who Again is Being Chased And Stalked By Crazed Masked Killer And That's Kenny Hampson Character Who's Seeking Vengeance On Her And Her Friends That Freaked Him Out By a Dumb Stupid Prank, This Film Also Stars Veteran Actor The Late Ben Johnson Who For The First Time Ever Get To Star in a Slasher Film His Role As The Train Conducter Who's Checking All The Passenger Train Cas And Finding Dead Bodys, And it Was Great To See Older Actor Like Ben Johnson Who Have Started in Two Of Sam Peckinpath's Films "THE WILD BUNCH" With William Holden, Robert Ryan, And Warren Oates, And "THE GETAWAY" With Steve McQueen And Alli Mcgraw And Disney's "ANGLES IN THE OUTFIELD" And Also Too There's David Copperfield in His First Film Role, The Director Who Made This Film is Roger Spottiswoode Who Also Have Done The James Bond Film "TOMORROW NEVER DIES" With Pierce Brosnan, "AIR AMERICA" With Robert Downey Jr. And Mel Gibson And "THE 6TH DAY" With Arnold Schwarzenegger And This is Roger Spottiswoode's First Feature Film Dubet.
"Terror Train" is one of the few horror films that Jamie Lee Curtis did after the classic "Halloween", that was actually a pretty dang good horror flick (besides "Prom Night", but that's arguable by many).
Recommended for fans of Jamie Lee Curtis' earlier horror movies, or anyone who enjoys a good slasher movie (and I might add, this would be a great film to show at a party).
There is little gore, but that seems irrelevant with all the mystery that is surrounding the teens aboard the train, which in itself, is an interesting place for a horror film to be set - nowhere to run after all.Aside from the fantastic Jamie Lee Curtis, the rest of the cast are a mixed lot.
Jamie Lee Curtis playing a role, more or less, like the one she played in "Holloween" as the one that not only got away from the slasher but was involved in taking him out with the help of the train conductor Crane, Ben Johnson,gives her usual "Screem Queen" performance as collage student Alanda Maxwell.We know already from the start who the killer is since we see him being driven mad by a collage prank engineered by collage prankster Doc Manly, Hart Bachner, some three years earlier with an unsuspecting Alanda being part of Doc's sick joke.
After the success with Halloween, Jamie Lee Curtis followed-up with similar films such as The Fog, Prom Night, Halloween II, and this pathetic thing, Terror Train.
Of the slasher films that Jamie Lee Curtis would appear in after the masterful Halloween (1978), Terror Train is truly the best.
Jamie Lee Curtis,Ben Johnson,a train and the killer.