6. Mind the Doors! - Death Line (1972)
Death Line, aka Raw Meat for American audiences, is famous simply for the line Mind the Doors! a phrase screamed by the films antagonist cannibal. It is not a scream to induce horror though as the portrayal of this monster is surprisingly sympathetic. The film centres around the searching of the London underground for whatever is lurking in the dark and killing the commuters who wait at the stations alone. The combined effort of a detective, an American student and his British girlfriend seek to find what has happened to a politician who went missing whilst at the underground station after they were the last ones to see him. In fact it was the cannibal who took him into the dark tunnels of the railway for himself and his pregnant female counterpart to feed on. The cannibals story is elaborated upon throughout the film explaining that he is descendant, a de-evolved one at that, of some Victorian railway construction workers who were trapped by a sudden collapse of the ceiling back in 1892. With the company in financial failure following the collapse and believing all the workers were either dead or unlikely to be saved alive, the company decided not to attempt to free them from the rubble. Nearly a century on and the offspring of these workers had become subterranean cannibals preying on the commuters of Russell Square and Holborn. The male cannibal is one of the last surviving and once his pregnant mate dies he is the last of his kind. This creatures only alternative to extinction is to find another mate so he abducts Trish, the British student, in order to continue his family. The primordial cannibal does not understand why Trish is petrified of him and his advances whereas she believes the creature will kill her. This leads to the creature attempting to explain with the only phrase he knows, Mind the Doors, a corrupted version of what he hears constantly from the train conductors at the stations. The most shocking thing about this scene is the sympathy that the audience feel for the creature. The man is simply trying to live as best as he can whilst the backstory given to him makes his plight even more sad, his family were betrayed by their employer and were forced to live this life, a tragic antagonist who is beaten badly by Trishs saviour an succumbs to his wounds. http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=r97IHkxbU8A