Steineded How sad is this?

Murphy Howard I enjoyed watching this film and would recommend other to give it a try , (as I am) but this movie, although enjoyable to watch due to the better than average acting fails to add anything new to its storyline that is all too familiar to these types of movies.

Jonah Abbott There's no way I can possibly love it entirely but I just think its ridiculously bad, but enjoyable at the same time.

Juana what a terribly boring film. I'm sorry but this is absolutely not deserving of best picture and will be forgotten quickly. Entertaining and engaging cinema? No. Nothing performances with flat faces and mistaking silence for subtlety.

UK Shaun Death Line (1972)Listed here on IMDb as Raw Meat. The Blu-ray is called Death Line. I think I prefer the title Death Line, as Raw Meat sounds like some lousy lousy B-movie. I had read about Death Line, so I had preconceived ideas of what it might be like. Made 45 years ago in 1972, the picture quality looked rather good. I won't go into story detail, as others have covered this here on IMDb already. Some reviews mention Soho, London. I really wanted to see Soho in the 1970's. What we see, are close up 'arty shots' of strip bar entrances, out of focus, heavily blurred, serving as a colourful backdrop to the long intro credit sequence, during which the music loops, and grates after a while.The film takes the viewer to Russell Square underground train station, both outside at night and inside through tunnels, on platforms, abandoned parts filled with huge arches and rubble. These locations help lift Death Line above the norm, as they are rather fascinating, assuming you are interested in architecture of this nature. Its real, no CGI.Special FX - 'The Man' hairy, with abscesses, spots, looks as grimy as you might expect someone to look, living in a place with no running water etc. There is a scene that sees someone with a rather wobbly axe buried in their head complete with bright red blood. The few other violent acts are implied rather than seen. By 2017 standards, I guess it's safe to say, Death Line is quite tame.How to rate Death Line ? It's odd ball. It's low budget. It certainly takes the view there. It's not 10/10 neither is it 1/10 (both these scores appear here on IMDb). Do you score something based on what it is, or do you also take into account the era, the budget. It's not 9/10, 8/10, and its better than 5/10 and possibly 6/10. 7/10 is about right.Cast performances: Hugh Armstrong, who plays the part of 'The Man' who lives in the London Underground lesser known areas, is rather good at playing what amounts to a caveman like creature that hasn't see light for a while. Admittedly his performance looks somewhat theatrical, like someone on stage rather than in front of a camera. Looking on the IMDb database, it appears he suffered long periods without acting. Bizarre, as he seems rather talented.Donald Pleasence, who plays the part of Inspector Calhoun, helps Death Line from feeling too dated. My experience of Pleasence, he performs in much the same way in everything I've seen him in, which isn't a bad thing.Christopher Lee, appears briefly as an MI5 agent. Wearing a bowler hat and sporting a thick black moustache, looked like the lead singer from the Red Hot Chilli Peppers, Anthony Kiedis, which is something I'd never picked up on in the past. Sharon Gurney, who plays the part of Patricia Wilson looks quite attractive, sporting a hairstyle from the era. I had never heard of her before, and IMDb indicates she only remained in acting for 6 years.David Ladd, who plays the part of Alex Campbell, an American student in London and Patricia's boyfriend. I wasn't sure what to make of him. He tended to over act like many actors from the 70's 80's. I thought someone else could have played the part better. Unlike the rest of the leading cast, Ladd shows the films age.

Joe Stemme I finally caught up with this on MGM HD. I had heard so many good things about it over the last couple of decades. The most common mini-review boiled down to something to the effect of, "RAW MEAT is a crude title for a subtle and effective horror film." Have to say, I agree with the naysayers here. It is a very poorly paced film. It takes over 20 minutes to get to the underground lair stuff, and it just jumps right into that (admittedly brilliantly done) tracking shot the film is famous for. I'm not averse to slow build-ups, but, here, it's just drawn out police procedural stuff that the audience knows from the opening scene is NOT going to be central to the horror plot. Pleasence is amusing, but his scenes come off as a Pilot for a British police TV show.And, as superbly done as the tracking shot is, it just seems plopped into the movie because they realized that it was fast approaching the 30 minute mark and they better get on with it! All of a sudden we cut from the police and young couple story into the "horror plot". It's just too abrupt to be as effective as it could (and SHOULD) have been.As to the rest of RAW MEAT. It's OK, but there really is no forward momentum with the plotting. Although there are a couple of neat shocks (and I mean ONLY a couple), it's pretty obvious where things are heading. Christopher Lee is really good in his one 3 minute scene (but, damn, many fans must have been real angry over the years when they see how disproportionate his billing is!).Why does RAW MEAT have such a strong reputation? I can only surmise that in those Pre-Internet days, a few good reviews in mags like Cinefantastique carried a lot of weight. Combined with how hard it has been to see over the years, and those fleeting good moments such as the tracking shot grow to semi-legendary status. And, heck, it was pretty gory for a "classy" British horror film back in the day, so it had that going for it, too.Worth seeing once.

Scott LeBrun This movie's story: in the bowels of the Earth below the streets of London, there exists an area that had been buried in the late 19th century by a cave-in. One might not think it possible, but the people who were sealed off managed to survive. Now, 80 years later, their last living descendant (Hugh Armstrong) is about to make his existence known to the outside world. People start disappearing, but the ball only really gets rolling when a prominent public servant (top character actor James Cossins) vanishes. The chief police inspector on the case, Calhoun (Donald Pleasence), realizes that he has his hands full, but vows to stick it out, despite the matter now being more in the domain of MI5.This marked the debut fictional theatrical feature for the young American director Gary Sherman, who also came up with the story; he went on to direct such nifty 1980s pictures as "Dead & Buried" and "Vice Squad". He and his crew make excellent use of some *extremely* atmospheric locations. They're dark, they're filthy, and they're dripping with water. "Death Line" (a.k.a. "Raw Meat") can take credit for bringing horror to the London tubes almost a decade before "An American Werewolf in London". The makeup effects and gore are very well done, and this is additionally blessed with a highly offbeat music score composed by Wil Malone and Jeremy Rose. The camera-work is utterly fantastic - wait for the approximately 10 minute sequence from about 23 minutes in to 33 minutes in for a memorable tracking shot showcasing the monsters' lair.It's well worth noting that our hideous killer is far from being malicious. He's really more pitiable than anything else, especially as he goes into mourning at one point, and tries to make a connection with lovely young Patricia Wilson (Sharon Gurney), uttering the only English words that he's ever managed to learn. You really feel his despair and sadness when it comes to his companion, the Woman (June Turner).Donald Pleasence is an absolute delight in our lead role, playing the material with a heavy dose of humour. His Inspector Calhoun is hilariously surly, and witty. David Ladd (one of Alan Ladds' sons) does okay as American student Alex Campbell, but the character is pretty insensitive and hostile for a while, only earning our sympathy towards the end. Gurney is highly appealing as his girlfriend. Top notch supporting players include Norman Rossington, Clive Swift, Heather Stoney, Hugh Dickson, and Ron Pember. Sir Christopher Lee is great fun to watch, albeit kind of wasted in a cameo role as MI5 agent Stratton-Villiers.Horror fans need to add this one to their watch list, if they haven't seen it already. It's too good to pass up.Eight out of 10.

Robert J. Maxwell American International Pictures. Directed by someone you never heard of. One recognizable name in the cast. Minuscule budget. Title: "Raw Meat." Sounds pretty bad.And it is, in some ways, which is too bad because it's quite entertaining in other ways.Getting the weaknesses out of the way, in 1892 an isolated portion of the London underground collapsed, trapping a couple of men and women who survived in air pockets and became cannibals to survive. Now they kidnap and eat the occasional passenger from the adjoining Russell Square station. Ho hum. Usually the monsters aren't human but rather some kind of insect. There are verrry sloowww pans across the half-eaten bodies slung from meat hooks. Lots of blood and raw meat. Skeletons litter the filthy floor. It's enough to keep you out of subways. But the population of cannibals has been reduced over the years to one couple, a disheveled man whose wife dies in childbirth.A young couple -- David Ladd (Alan's son) and the attractive Sharon Gurney -- discover an unconscious man at the deserted station. By the time they get a cop on the scene, the body is gone. Ladd and Gurney make their report at the police station.This is where the movie takes on some life. The Inspector is Donald Pleasance in one of his best roles. He's like Inspector Moss on speed, and he has his Sergeant Lewis, whom he is always chewing out. Pleasance is always so snotty and irritable. Every time he tells his desk sergeant to bring him a cup of tea he must now cope with "tea bags" that are now standard issue, instead of the old-fashioned tea leaves that he's accustomed to. The tea bags disgust him. For the rest of the movie, he's constantly probing around in his cup, trying to extract the hated pouch, throwing it over his shoulder with careless abandon. He and his subordinate have some sparkling conversational exchanges too. And Pleasance is warned off the case by Christopher Lee, in a brief appearance, who tells him, "Your delicate footsteps are being heard in places where cautious people tread lightly." But the movie spends too much time down in the chill, black, dripping tunnels of the underground and not enough with the police. Pleasance is told by the medical examiner that the blood found at the scene contained Pasturella pestis, the black plague, Pleasance replies, "He sounds poorly." And much later, out of nowhere, he inquires, "Sergeant, have you ever had a case of Pastorina pelvis?" It's funnier in context than in print.Alas, the story is drawn -- presumably by commercial necessity -- back into the world of monsters and slashers. And there are loopholes in the plot that you could drive a Lincoln Navigator through. For instance, the plague plays no part in the story.I enjoyed the cops. I read a magazine during the monster intervals.