Canada, USA, 1979
97m
35mm film, colour
A Canadian/American horror film directed by Roger Spottiswoode.
Plot Summary
The students of Northern Illinois University are celebrating New Year’s Eve with a party. Among them is Alana Maxwell who is less than thrilled to be there and who is dragged into a cruel practical joke involving the shy and socially awkward Kenny Hampson and the corpse of a young woman stolen from the medical school. Kenny is so traumatised by the prank that he ends up in a psychiatric hospital. Three years later, the same students arrange New Year’s Eve fancy dress party aboard a train but Ed is murdered before he can even get on, the killer stealing his Groucho Marx mask. As the students are entertained by a magician the killer wanders around the train killing with impunity, Alana comes to suspect that the killer is Kenny looking for revenge, leading to a climactic confrontation in the train’s staff car…
Credits
Crew
Directed by: Roger Spottiswoode
© Triple T Productions (Astral) Ltd. 1979
Harold Greenberg and Sandy Howard present an Astral Bellevue Pathé production in association with Sandy Howard Productions/Daniel Grodnik
Executive Producer: Lamar Card
Produced by: Harold Greenberg
Written by: T.Y. Drake
Photographed by: John Alcott
Edited by: Anne Henderson
Music Composed by: John Mills-Cockell
Sound Mixer: Bo Harwood
Costume Designer: Penny Hadfield
Make Up: Joan Isaacson, Michelle Burke
Hairdressing: Huguette Roy
Special Make-up Consultant: Alan Friedman
Special Effects: Josef Elsner
Illusions Created by: David Copperfield
Production Designer: Glenn Bydwell
Casting: Ingrid Fischer, Anna St. Johns
Cast
Ben Johnson (Carne)
Jamie Lee Curtis (Alana)
Hart Bochner (Doc)
Sandee Currie (Mitchy)
Timothy Webber (Mo)
Derek MacKinnon (Kenny Hampson)
Anthony Sherwood (Jackson)
Joy Boushel (Pet)
D.D. Winters (Merry)
Greg Swanson (class president)
Howard Busgang (Ed)
David Copperfield (the magician)
Steve Michaels (brakeman)
Victor Knight (engineer)
Don Lamoureux (Shovels)
Charles Biddles Sr (chief porter)
Elizabeth Cholette (dispatcher)
Thomas Haverstock (Bill Chase)
Peter Feingold (Senior)
Richard Weinstein, John Busby (pledges)
References
Periodicals
- Cinefantastique vol.10 no.4 (Spring 1981) p.48 – note
- Cinema Canada vol.3 no.63 (March 1980) p.3-4
- Cinema Canada vol.3 no.70 (December 1980) p.34-35
- Copie Zéro no.10 (1981) p.42 – credits
- Fangoria no.222 (May 2003) p.38-39 – illustrated article (Forgotten Horrors: Terror Train by John Wooley and Michael H. Price)
- Film Score Monthly vol.9 no.8 (September 2004) p.46 – DVD review (Laserphile: Frightfully good by Andy Dursin)
- The Hollywood Reporter vol.259 no.20 (27 November 1979) p.14 – credits
- Monthly Film Bulletin vol.47 no.563 (December 1980) p.244-5
- Motion Picture Product Digest vol.8 no.11 (5 November 1980) p.42
- Screen International no.269 (29 November 1980) p.14
- Sight and Sound vol.3 no.10 (October 1993) p.62 – video review
- Starburst no.30 (1981) p.16-17
- Starburst no.310 (May 2004) p.87 – DVD review (DVD reviews by Richard Houldsworth)
- Variety 1 October 1980 p.22
