Review #324: 'Raw Meat' (1973)

When an important government agent goes missing at Russell Square Tube Station in London, Inspector Calhoun (Donald Pleasence) and Detective Rogers (Norman Rossington) are assigned to the case. They discover previous disappearances in the same area, and also bring in American student Alex (David Ladd), who along with his girlfriend Patricia (Sharon Gurney), were the last people to see him alive. Lurking in a caved-in and disused tunnel near to the Tube Station is a plague-ravaged cannibal who has remained there since the cave-in years before.

Known as Death Line in the UK, this film had completely eluded me until it turned up in the Grindhouse Project. It is shocking that this is so little-known, as it is an astoundingly accomplished and wittily scripted little British horror film, complete with a genuinely unsettling atmosphere, gruesome violence, and that quintessential Britishness. The first time I realised I was watching a gem is when I witnessed the technically impressive tracking shot that occurs around twenty minutes in. It is a magnificent introduction to the monster, as we move around half-decomposed bodies, dripping taps, and rats. The set design department should be proud, as everything looks real; the dampness, the stench and the squalor.

The horror is not the only factor that makes this a very good film; the script, by Ceri Jones, is full of wit and great subtle touches. The two policemen are constantly taking the piss out of each other and have great chemistry, and it all plays out so naturally. Pleasence looks like he's having a ball, whether it be the scene in which he steals whisky from a dead man's house, or when he's getting pissed in the pub and refusing to leave. And Rossington makes for a great straight-man. Even Christopher Lee pops up in an inspired cameo as MI5 agent Stratton-Villiers. A true underrated gem, then, and here's to a mass re-discovery and a cult following.


Directed by: Gary Sherman
Starring: Donald Pleasence, Norman Rossington, David Ladd, Sharon Gurney, Christopher Lee
Country: UK

Rating: ****

Tom Gillespie