The Sleeping Car

My review was written in March 1990 after watching the film on Vidmark video cassette.

"The Sleeping Car' is an above-average horror flick released theatrically Feb. 2 in regional markets such as Pittsburgh and Nashville ahead of it video debut in mid-May.

Effort by Vidmark aimed at theatrical audiences would probably have gotten a better shot several years ago before horror pics glutted the market.

It has a stronger plot and cast than usual in limning the familiar tale of haunting, in this case a railroad car that was the scene of sex and murder ten years earlier.

David Naughton is a little long in the tooth, but effective anyway, as the hero on the rebound from a failed marriage (with Dani Minnick) who goes back to school to study journalism with hip prof Jeff Conaway (a fun performance).

He rents the sleeping car as a cheap abode from goofy landlady Ernestinge Mercer and has '60s hippie leftover Kevin McCarthy as an even goofier neighbor. Thanks to interesting gore and makeup effects by John Carl Buechler (also doubling as actor in the ten-years-earlier segments), pic's depiction of poltergeist appearances has some novelty and drive.

Douglas Curtis pilots the picture with self-assurance, stumbling only in a series of false wakeup endings that are a direct lift from John Landis' "An American Werewolf in London", which also starred Naughton.

Greg O'Neill's flippant and unpretentious script is refreshing, giving Naughton plenty of tongue-in-cheek rejoinders to lighten up the film and establish a tone early on that's amplified by Conaway' "everything is everything" approach.

Judie Aronson, who made a nice impression in a small role in "Cool Blue", is an unusual looking beauty who is arresting as the sexually liberated romantic lead. Effects by Buechler and others are solid.

''The Sleeping Car' is by no means a good film. It's slow moving, lacks any atmosphere, and gets rather tedious at times, but it still manages to deliver the goods, or at least some of them. The production values are passable, but far from bad, and the script works to a degree, but for some reason the pieces don't fall into place as they should. The body count is only four, making it too tame to be a slasher movie (though it does hint at that, especially during the overlong climax), but too juvenile to be a psychological thriller/horror film.

The acting isn't bad, but it sure isn't all that great. It seems like the actors were booked for three or four days for filming, and just wanted to get it over with, so they didn't seem to put a lot of effort into it. No one in particular stands out, and the characters don't make the movie any more interesting. On top of that, none of the characters are very well developed, with the exception of the professor, so that does little to help the cause.

Still the movie does have several things working for it, not the least of which is some pretty impressive special effects for a movie of this caliber. Another is the creative and very gruesome death scenes, which may be the best part of this 'not quite there, but close' horror flick

6/10

THE SLEEPING CAR opens with a couple having sex aboard a train as it rolls down the tracks. Clickity clack! Too bad for them that it crashes and explodes. Boom!

Next, we're introduced to Jason McCree (David Naughton) who moves into his new apartment, which is a renovated train car. It's a nice place, except for the ghost. He's called "The Mister" and he's one unhappy spook!

Death and alleged "hilarity" commence.

Anyone remembering Naughton from his role in AN AMERICAM WEREWOLF IN LONDON might expect this movie to be equally enjoyable. It's not. At all.

This is a ridiculous horror-comedy containing more cheeeze than a Super Bowl party! As far as the "humor" goes, there are more groaners here than in any packed Emergency Room!

ONE REASON TO WATCH THIS: If you've ever wanted to see a college professor folded into a sofa bed. Now, that's funny!...

Perhaps I am being generous with this one, considering I just watched Suspiria, but I found this to be a very colourful, interesting looking movie, with a lot of atmospheric blue lighting contrasted against deep reds , bright yellows, and it has a couple of clever moments (including death by fold-up sofa, probably the most memorable) and it has a good look to it, overall, but.....

So much of the dialogue is poorly written, unfunny one-liners, the characters become annoying, and even at a brief 80-minutes, this tale of a man living in a converted train car, haunted by the spirit of John Karl Beuchler, seems padded, with its especially drawn out ending taking up nearly fifteen minutes of the run time.

Still, it isn't *terrible*, and might be worth a single watch, for fans of cheeseball 1980s horror, but anything more than that is asking too much from this one.

If you've ever wondered what a horror film written by a Woody Allen wannabe would come out like, then check this one out. It's imaginatively directed, has a typical but enjoyable "haunted place" premise, solid makeup effects....it's an all-around good job, but with one major flaw: the dialogue is overloaded with cheeky wisecracks and witticisms (sample: "You want scary? Go shopping with my ex-wife") that sometimes hit the mark, but are too often delivered at the most inappropriate moments (even while the hero is battling an evil ghost!). (**)