Almost exactly ten years ago, Japanese filmmaker Ryûhei Kitamura‘s first American film, an adaptation of Clive Barker’s short story The Midnight Meat Train for Lionsgate, was getting ready to hit theaters amid a whole lot of buzz. Suddenly, the release was delayed, the film ultimately dumped onto a very small number of screens.
Clive Barker himself was outspoken about the burial at the time, offering the following: “Though I mourn the fact that The Midnight Meat Train was never given its chance in theaters, it’s a beautifully stylish, scary movie, and it isn’t going anywhere. People will find it, and whether they find it in midnight shows or they find it on DVD, they’ll find it.”
Barker was right, as horror fans did eventually discover (and embrace) Kitamura’s brutal Midnight Meat Train. In a new chat with Mick Garris on the podcast Post Mortem, Kitamura reflects on what happened ten years ago, which he describes as a dark time.
“It was very heartbreaking because it was my first American movie. And I was very proud of the movie,” Kitamura told Garris. “And the last I heard was, ya know, they got so excited and they even set a release date. I still remember… 2008… May 16th. That’s a very good day. Hot summer day. They were confident with the movie. And they released the trailer… I still remember, when I went to Arclight Cinema to see Rambo 4, the trailer was there. I was like, ‘WOW.’ And then… all this craziness happens.”
Kitamura, whose new movie Downrange just hit Shudder streaming, continued, “I know exactly what happened but I don’t feel like I want to speak about it. It’s just… [an] ego thing. It’s as simple as… the Lionsgate people, when I was making the movie… and the time when it came to release… was a different [group of people].”
Essentially, Kitamura explains that producer Peter Block being ousted from Lionsgate was Midnight Meat Train‘s downfall. Block had been hardcore behind the film, and the people who took over insisted on scrubbing his projects off their own slate.
“There’s another big reason, but I don’t really want to [get into it]. It was the biggest terrorist attack to my life. Worst time of my career… emotionally and financially.“
