MovieChat Forums > Terror Train (1980) Discussion > A different ending[SPOILERS]

A different ending[SPOILERS]

posted 18 years ago by jong19822004
6 replies | jump to latest

I imagined a much darker ending to this movie. In the end when alana goes to the car after finding Copperfield dead and realizing he's not the killer, she sees who she thinks is Carne with his back to her standing in the corner. She puts her hand on him and he turns around to reveal he's the killer! He's holding a knife and wearing the grouchomask with the conductorhat in the exact pose as the posterart. He slashes her and throws her out the train and she falls and hits the ice. What if it ended like that? Heroines have been eliminated before[Laurie in HALLOWEEN:RESSURECTION AND Ripley in ALIEN3,although her clone stars in ALIEN:RESSURECTION. Funny how both those sequels wind up with the word ressurection,isn't it?]. Brian Depaulma's BLOW OUT has a gutsy ending that also does this. In HE KNOWS YOUR ALONE, it's a question mark becouse her jilted fiance shows up at the end as she prepares for her wedding alone. Did any of you think he had killed Carne before he showed up to save the day? What would you think if they had this more chilling ending instead?

[–] gizmosloth 18 years ago

yeah it would have been different for better or worse well maybe not for worse but good caue both endings would be good and yeah they killed off the heroine in halloween and alien but thats after a few movies and i think they did it not expecting to make anymore sequals or atleast no more sequals with that character

[–] 18 years ago

[deleted]

[–] Shorty53077 16 years ago

kind of ruins what horror films were like in the 80's though, it seems to me at that time the virgin good girl had to live for the whole submeaning of the horror flicks. booze, sex = death. the pure virgin lives.

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Hey Laser Lips Yo Momma Was A Snow Blower - Johnny 5

[–] ChrisFrost 16 years ago

That's a lousy idea.

[–] Johan_Hampus_Carlsson 16 years ago

The original ending sucked ass,so it could only get better.

[–] lauriescreams 15 years ago

Terror Train adheres closely to the Halloween formula as described by Vera Dika in her book on what she calls The Stalker Cycle:

-There is a crime in the past, to which the killer's present actions are linked.
-The killer acts in the present, offing members of the young community.
-Someone realises the danger, either an older member of the community.
-The heroine is drawn into a confrontation with the heroine, where she defeats him or holds him off til help arrives.
-The heroine is typically not free at the end.

The Halloween formula proved amazingly popular and was adopted by many so-called slashers: House on Sorority Row, The Burning, Hell Night, My Bloody Valentine, Friday the 13th, Prom Night, Happy Birthday to Me, He Knows You're Alone, The Prey, Sweet 16, and The Prowler, just to name some of the more famous ones.

In other words, the generic convention in the early 80's was for the heroine to live, but not getting away scott free. Alana has to live with her guilt, because of the role she played in the crime in the past (even if she was tricked or goaded into doing it). Some slashers did, of course, break with this convention, even while adherring to all the others - Madman is probably the best example.