Those of you who know me personally are aware of how deeply my love of Clive Barker‘s work runs. When a well worn copy of the first Book of Blood found its way into my hands at the tender age of thirteen, I immediately devoured it and was forever changed. Much in the same way Lovecraft and Poe attacked the horror genre from their entirely unique perspectives, Barker had not only changed the rules, but literally (<--hey lookie, proper use of the term literally) rewrote the template for modern horror. After reading the insanely sick introduction to the Books, in which a fake psychic finds himself at the mercy of an all-too-real malevolent spirit who proceeds to etch the anthology’s stories onto his very flesh, literally making him the book of blood… Oh yes, I was hooked!

I then proceeded to read the first story from the Books of Blood, Midnight Meat Train, while on a NYC subway train on the way to school. Meat Train turned out to be about a fella who winds up at the end of a NYC subway line and accidentally discovers a secret underworld of barbaric murderers and monsters. And here I sat on a NYC train, one stop from the end of the line. Freaked much? Uh, yeah.

Anyhoo, I’m sure half of you already know that they’re making Midnight Meat Train into a movie.

Hang on… I wanna be excited about this. Gimme a second….

Sure, it’s easy for me to get excited when Barker puts out a new book — jeez, me shorthairs are automatically stimulated just thinking about it — but I’m always on the fence when his stuff gets adapted for the screen.

I may be the guy who’d sit in line for two hours if he put out a book of ballet quotes, but on average his movie adaptations have had a … how do you say … (let’s be nice) hit or miss quality about them. For example: Hellraiser, awesome. Hellraiser IV: Pins in Space, not so much.

Right out of the gate, casting Vinnie Jones as Mahogany is a bold, if blatantly divergent, choice. Mahogany is written as past-his-prime — definitely not how I’d describe Jones.

I’ll stop now before I talk myself onto a ledge. Let’s catch a peek at the trailer up over at First Showing, shall we? [Link]

So here’s hoping they don’t Rawhead Rex the shit out of it!