Amok Train - Fahrt ins Nichts

Amok Train ( a far better title) tells the tale of a group of American students on a study trip in Serbia who are first terrorized by an evil village, and then by a runaway train they they attempt to escape on. It's all because one of the students is a "chosen one" of a group of devil worshippers.

The film has so much going on, it's never boring, even if some of the story and acting are a bit hokey, there are always plenty of things to look at and some outrageous gore is showcased, including a face being pulled off, decapitations, impalements galore, and quite a shocking dismemberment of one poor guy caught between moving carriages.

Actually some of the most frightening scenes of the movie are those depicting the actors being filmed on the moving train. We see them running alongside and jumping aboard, clambering over the top of it, hanging off the sides and dangling between the couplings - all while the train is clearly moving at some speed. I don't know how they filmed all of this, it looks completely hair-raising. If these are faked via special effects, then I take my hat off in admiration.

There are some rather shonky miniature models that spoil some of the tension, but the movie is otherwise beautifully photographed, and the music is great too. It's bursting with energy and great visuals, reminiscent of Lamberto Bava's "Demons" , and the more obscure "Spider Labyrinth", so if you have seen and enjoyed either of those, and can suspend your criticisms, you'll have fun with this.

Beyond the Door III (1989)

* 1/2 (out of 4)

In 1974 the Italian film CHI SEI? was released in America as BEYOND THE DOOR. The film was one of many rips of THE EXORCIST but it made enough money to where future producers would remember the "new" title. In 1979 Mario Bava made a film called SHOCK but since the title wasn't catchy enough it was renamed BEYOND THE DOOR II even though it had nothing to do with the first film. Then, in 1989, there was AMOK TRAIN, another weak title that couldn't grab people so the producer's decided to call it BEYOND THE DOOR III. So, in a fifteen year period we had three films in the BEYOND THE DOOR series and yet it wasn't ever a real title or series for that matter. You gotta love these Italian name changes (check out DAWN OF THE DEAD and ZOMBI for more).

The "story" has seven American teenagers taking a school trip to Yugoslavia where they will witness a pre-Christian passion play. One of the girls (Mary Kohnert) doesn't want to go because she's actually from this small village but the group ends up there and soon the locals are trying to kill them. It turns out the girl is a virgin so she's prime material to become the wife of Lucifer. The kids end up on a train where they think they're making an escape but it's just leading them to one gruesome death after another. BEYOND THE DOOR III or AMOK TRAIN, whatever you want to call it, has some pretty good stuff going for it but sadly the story is just so bad and pointless that the majority of the running time you're wishing a train would run you over so you could get pass the boredom. Most of the movie takes place on this train and there's not a single thing going on. The kids talk about what's going on. A few new characters enter the picture. The kids talk some more and this just keeps going and going. I'm really confused why they'd build some beautiful sets of the villages and then only shoot there for what ends up being about ten-minutes worth of screen time. This village looks quite good and had a rather nice atmosphere so why they selected to go on the train is anyone's guess. The film runs 94-minutes in its uncut state and the majority of that time is just boring dialogue or we have a couple kids not on the train who walk around not doing a thing. The film actually does have some good things going for it with one being the cinematography by Adolfo Bartoli. There's no question this was an extra low-budget movie but you wouldn't know it just by looking at the film because it looks very professional and that's not hardly the case with these type of films. Another plus are the gore effects, which are quite good looking and since this is an Italian movie we get all sorts of bloody deaths. The first murder involves one of the strangest decapitations I've ever seen and things just get more gory from here including one sequence where a woman peels her face off. The Lucifer creature here is pretty silly looking though. Most of the cast is forgettable but we do get Bo Svenson in a brief role as the Professor. It's too bad a better screenplay wasn't written for this thing and it's a shame most of the time took place on the train because there are enough decent elements here that should have made for a better movie.

Sometimes you stumble over those kind of movies where the main and haunting question is - what the heck did the writer(s) smoke!? Beyond the Door III aka Amok Train aka Death Train is such a movie. What we get is some ancient satanic ritual in a rural community of Yugoslavia mixed with a good part of what is some kind of early and low budget Unstoppable (Denzel Washington, Chris Pine, 2010) - in one scene the runaway (demon-possessed!?) train even drives thru a small lake without any railway tracks just to kill some of the poor Americans! But on the other side we get a fine sniff of gore here and there and some well composed dark and weird mood including some satanic ritual (just too delicious the scene where the old witch screams: she's not a ******!) and some fine visuals (for a B-movie).

My rate would be a straight 5 but for the smoking question I add 1 more - so my overall rate is a well-deserved 6.

A group of students from Los Angeles take a trip to Serbia to learn about their culture and an ancient ceremony. After a strange turn of events, some of them hop a train to escape. Big mistake.

"Beyond the Door III" (1989) has the same set-up as the future "Subspecies" (1991), but don't look for any vampirism as it mixes bits of "The Wicker Man" (1973) with a lot of "Runaway Train" (1985) and a dash of devilry.

It was released on video as "Amok Train" in the USA and as "Death Train" in the UK, both of which are better titles since this is a stand-alone flick with zero to do with the first two "Beyond the Door" movies from 1974 and 1977. It's an Italian/Yugoslavian production and when Epic Productions acquired the distribution rights, they simply changed its working title, "The Train," to "Beyond the Gates III" in the hopes of better sales.

Don't look for any humor. This is deadly serious horror-adventure with increasing supernatural happenings. It has a darkly artistic bent like "Runaway Train," although it's not exceptional like that powerful film (not to mention being a different genre). There are no less than four quality women in the flick, but their presence is never really capitalized on (and I'm not talking 'bout nudity or sleaze).

The biggest problem is the puzzling things that happen with little logic. I'd give examples but I don't want to give anything away. Can everything in the story be logically explained or did the supernatural angle simply give the screenwriter license to include several 'cool' aspects with little rhyme or reason?

The film runs 1 hour, 34 minutes, and was shot in Serbia.

GRADE: B-

Third entry in the series of films that have nothing to do with each other. The original title for this one is Amok Train, though it's better known as Beyond the Door III. It involves a group of college students heading to Yugoslavia. Once there, it is revealed that the virgin of the group, Beverly, is intended to be the bride of the devil.

This is a really bad movie with some truly lousy gore scenes. The deaths themselves are creative enough, but the effects are terrible, several of them using blatantly obvious dummy heads. The characters are also an unlikable bunch who treat Beverly poorly for no good reason. They also never seem to much care when something otherworldly happens. One guy kisses his possessed girlfriend and gets a mouth full of maggots in the process. The girl then proceeds to rip her face off right in front of him, but the guy never mentions it and acts as if it didn't happen. We also get some hilarious scenes of the titular train going off the rails, all done with very bad miniature work.

This one's for those who like to laugh at bad movies. Anyone else should avoid. Funnily enough, it's still the most watchable film in this series of unrelated Euro flicks.