End of the Line

I just watched this movie and I immediately knew it was going to be awesome when it made me scream like a little school girl in the first 5 minutes of the film. OUT LOUD! I am a huge horror buff and not much even makes me yelp! It was a pleasant surprise, as most of the crap my brother brings over for me to watch usually doesn't make much sense or is just too out there to enjoy. But End of the Line is a great Canadian horror flick. Who needs zombies when you have religious fanatics trying to save non-believers with a razor sharp crucifix, sending them to the Almighty!? Sounds corny, but why not? How many hard core religious followers would kill in the name of their God if they were told the Apocylpse was coming? Not too far fetched to believe. And stuck in a subway during the whole thing!? The artwork on the DVD cover was right, "does what Jaws did for the ocean". I'll probably poop if I am ever caught down in a subway system after dark in a big city after seeing this. If you like horror movies, give End of the Line a shot. The acting at times is a small amount cheesy, but the story is great, so are the monsters and many of the unexpected awesome scares that a true horror fan will appreciate!

It's the 'End of the Line' for a group of train passengers trying to survive a cultist attack in this 2007 Canadian horror film.

We meet Karen, a very traumatized woman who has been having terrible nightmares involving being attacked on a subway train. After completing her during late evening shift at the hospital, Karen leaves and heads to take the train home still plagued by the nightmares she's been having along with strange drawings she's been receiving which has depictions of demons taking over the world. Once at the subway tracks. Karen notices a cute young man and makes eyes with him. Also there is a creepy man who starts harassing her. The other guy (Mike) stops anything bad from happening.

Once on the train, Karen is jolted when it suddenly stops mid tunnel. After some intense moments of Karen seeing visions of a dead girl on the tracks, we find out that there is a doomsday cult which has been consuming and distributing hallucinogen laced muffins which make people have visions of demons - Karen ate one at work. The goal of the cult is to save the souls of humanity for God, which is done by killing non-believers with swords and daggers. With the group set to take over the world, Karen and a group of train passengers will have to try and fight off the cultists who are committed to creating a mass suicide.

Shot entirely in Toronto, and being from the city, it was cool to see some very familiar subways station locations from our TTC transit line. The opening scene of the film was so effective, and had the best jump scare of the entire thing. 'End of the Line' was a pretty effective horror thriller with an interesting and very different premise than what we're used to in the genre. I thought having the main filming location be on a subway train (and in the tracks) helped build a very claustrophobic atmosphere which was great. The acting overall was alright, with Ilona Elkin leading the way as Karen. The major failure of the movie is how slow it runs after an exhilarating first 30 minutes. Once the characters go on the run to avoid the cultists, it kinda drags on and on and gets a bit dull.

All in all, I'd recommend giving 'End of the Line' a watch. It's got an interesting plot and some really well done kill scenes, it just drags on a bit too much in the middle towards the end.

6/10.

Karen is a nurse at a psychiatric hospital whose been having nightmares of jump scares recently(and yeah, those do make a lot of appearances in this... but it does build a proper atmosphere, and is a very tense ride). On her way home, the subway train she's on stops suddenly, and she and a group of other regular people find themselves chased by a cult(who are genuinely and effectively creepy, throughout; they make this, in part, a zombie flick) out for blood, who claim that judgment day is coming(and that death is the better fate). Is this just a band of mad believers, or could they actually be right? This keeps it vague enough that you continue to ask yourself that question throughout, right up until the great ending. It goes into themes about faith(without it saying that it's completely good or bad), religious fanaticism(how far will they go?), hypocrisy, status and the like. This is somewhat exploitative(with some truly brutal gore, and extremely disturbing sequences, if these are moderate in amount), and it gets quite cheesy(the killers all use crosses that function as knives, and one of them, a middle-aged guy no less, wields a friggin' sword). It doesn't overstay its welcome, and keeps to a solid pace, and it gets going quickly whilst at the same time developing the characters, all of whom are sufficiently likable and credible(no one is really obnoxious, albeit one member of the murdering lot is truly despicable... but we love to hate him, and it really works). The FX vary, however most are excellent(a couple of designs and choices are questionable). This is at its best in the first 20 minutes or so, and if you find yourself not happy with the change after about that period of time, you might not like the rest of this. It does feel like the two portions of it don't completely fit together. The hour and a half do pass like nothing, and it has positive surprises along the way. Dialog tends to be fine, if there are a handful of lines that are... strange. Acting is so-so. There's a reason those on this cast aren't "names". There is some sexuality and a little strong language in this. I recommend this to fans of dark Gothic horror. 7/10

I just saw EOTL at the Palm Springs film festival, and I'm very pleased (the guy above would be also be pleased to know that this version was shortened to 95 minutes). It was the rare horror movie that did the fundamental thing right: made you care about the victims. Everyone, even the crazy cultists, was given layers and dimensions beyond surface stereotypes and caricatures (no token black-nerd-ditzy blonde-tough guy-final girl lineup here) This is also probably the only movie I've seen that's actually scary along with having graphic gore. The gore scenes themselves aren't scary, but they are intense, because they are happening to people that you've invested some emotion in. I'm also glad that the demon effects were used sparingly; Devereaux knows that real live crazy people can be much scarier. The atmosphere contributed greatly to this; I've always found scenes of people standing alone in those subway stations pretty creepy (best example: the scene with the Asian girl and the train. Those who've seen the movie will know what I'm talking about) The acting was top-notch across the board, my palms were actually sweating because I wanted at least most of the main cast to make it out alive. The special effects were not-surprisingly excellent; look for a nasty half-decapitation as a great example. Like I said before, it was good that the demons were rarely seen, but when they were, they were very well-done (aside from a few CGI ones, but they had to be in order to pull off certain stunts) Overall, I can give End of the Line the best praise for a horror movie: it does what it meant to do.

Prior to "End of the Line," the only thing I'd seen by writer-director Maurice Devereaux was a satirical short on PMS, done in the style of a '50s educational film (look it up on YouTube). Needless to say, this guy is a versatile talent worth keeping an eye on. Like many low-budget, independent horror films, "Line" begins fairly awkward, with wobbly performances, questionable makeup effects, and bizarre camera choreography. But after a deliberate buildup followed by an incredibly chilling segue into cold-blooded violence, "End of the Line" goes off and running to its own rhythm and tune, with near-total disregard for political correctness and moral scrutiny. The plot wouldn't seem so intensely button-pushing if we hadn't been inundated (especially in the wake of 9/11) with a rash of films that failingly attempt to rationalize and justify contemptible actions (on both sides) in the midst of warfare and natural disaster; Devereaux's 'monsters' are members of an expansive (and apparently global) religious sect, led by a Jim Jones type foretelling the impending apocalypse. Armed with crucifix daggers, strong belief, and Sunday Smiles, these zealots are the stuff of nightmares (proving once again what George Romero established in "Night of the Living Dead"--what a zombie does to a person is nothing compared to what the human survivors do to themselves). Beginning on a stopped subway car (where the PA crackles with cryptic, incoherent messages) and progressing through the subterranean tunnels below, a disparate group of survivors attempt to find their way to safety while being stalked by the murderous sect. The location is one of "Line"'s key strengths: the dimly-lit, desolate tunnels provide a thick, claustrophobic sense of desperation and isolation that only ratchets up the terror of the situation. Similarly, the performances by a cast of Stateside unknowns improves considerably as the film progresses, to the point where the viewer aligns his own survival instinct with that of the characters, and the desire to see them make it out alive. But like Romero, Devereaux isn't content with Happy Endings, and leaves us on an admirably ambiguous note that would do Dante Aligheri proud. "End of the Line" is a triumph for the genre.