Listen, horror. I've said it before. I hate literally everything about your genre. I can't abide gore unless it is camp. Cold-blooded skull squishery does not interest me, nor does Ted Raimi's eyeball blasting from its socket, nor does a human strung up and bleeding out like a slaughtered piggy. Nor monsters. It's nothing personal, I just DO NOT WANT IT IN MY AREA. Pleeeeease!

Even though my heart screams "WHAT THE FUCK IS WRONG WITH YOU PEOPLE?" I do, in fact, have a heart. And so I feel for all the crestfallen horror fans—Clive Barker included—protesting Lionsgate's extremely limited distribution of Barker's latest production, The Midnight Meat Train. Based on Barker's 1984 short story of the same name, The Midnight Meat Train has been relegated to a sad 100 or so discount theaters (I saw it in Federal Way for $2). And it's hard to say why. I've seen far, far worse horror movies on big screens in big multiplexes—The Hitcher, When a Stranger Calls, Saw II: Back in the Habit. Why not The Midnight Meat Train? At least it has Bradley Cooper (xoxo).

In an open letter to horror magazine Fangoria, Barker wrote: "This has nothing to do with the quality of our picture. In fact, it is happening to a number of other movies in Lionsgate's hands, many of which were guided into production by a great friend of horror movies, Peter Block, who left the company several months ago... It seems not to matter that a lot of very talented men and women sweated to create this picture—knowing that all the horror fans who see it, will love it. It's being dumped because of company politics." Ooh! Company politics! Oh... oh wait. I'm bored now.

The Midnight Meat Train is the story of an intrepid photographer (Cooper) who, desperate to make a splash in Brooke Shields's pants—I mean, a fancy art gallery—starts lurking around the subway station at night and snapping ne'er-do-wells in action. Meanwhile, a giant butcher played by Vinnie Jones is smooshing the brains of late-night train passengers with silent efficiency. The acting is awful and the writing silly and the premise stresses credulity beyond earthly limitations.

After an hour of screeching subway trains and macabre meat factories, we almost abandoned ship. I'm glad we stayed. The 11th-hour Big Reveal is so improbable and ridiculous that I actually almost liked it (it involves magic, kind of, and a vast conspiracy, and a ritualistic carving that looks far too much like the Van Halen logo). To me, anything is preferable to a straight-ahead serial-killer gorefest.

Anyway, unless you've already seen it, you'll most likely have to experience The Midnight Meat Train on DVD. Which is too bad, because it means you'll miss out on experiences like when, after a particularly awful meat-mallet decapitation, the white-haired man-mountain next to me yelled, "Hey, her head's off!" That's what moviegoing is all about, people. Curse you, Lionsgate. recommended

lindy@thestranger.com