Starring Xia Yi-Yao, Zhu Ya, Mu Sa, Yin Chao-Te and Zhang Lei. Written by Hou Shuang and Zhang Shengfan. Directed by Lin Zhenzhao.
Jiangsu Zhonglele Film/Hubei Changjiang Publishing & Media Group Co.

A doctor called Su Zhenghai (Chao-Te), his young son Yue Sheng and his two grown-up daughters Ting Ting (Yi-Yao) & Ling Ling (Ya) find themselves on a steam train on the verge of being overrun by disease-ridden, murderous rats! 

Also known as JUNKRAT TRAIN and RATS ON A TRAIN, this mainland Chinese movie is set during the period of the Republic of China and definitely delivers on what its title promises.

We don’t have to wait too long before swarms of (not-too-hot CGI) rodents start cascading from the roof of the carriages, engulfing anyone unfortunate enough to be anywhere near them.

The survivors rush to the front end of the train (a real steam train is used, which is cool), only to discover that those who have been bitten and lived are now showing signs of Yersinia infection, a disease which will definitely kill them, but there could be salvation; Su Zhenghai informs everyone that he works for the National Health Administration and knows that Sulfanilamide medicine, a cure for the disease, is stored at a hospital in the town their train is about to reach. The locomotive stops at the designated station and Su Zhenghai disembarks, leading a small group on a mission to get the medicine, but time is of the essence, because the train driver will only wait for two hours and then he’ll be forced to leave before nightfall… because the light-hating rats will be swarming everywhere once the sun sets. 

Entering the rodent-devastated town, the group must traverse a street littered with many corpses and then cross over an alley packed with rats. They finally reach the hospital, which has been trashed by more rats…

The rodent scenes definitely work better in darker locations, where the poor quality of the CGI rats can be obscured by low lighting, such as the sequence involving the characters venturing into the dungeon-like bowels of the wrecked hospital. Here the intrepid team finally finds the medicine in a gloomy, dank storage area, which is also the home of a massive rat’s nest. The medicine is grabbed, but the protagonists must run for their lives now, as a tsunami of rats spill from the towering nest. Floods of rats pour from every building like a furry tidal wave as our heroes hurriedly exit the town!

Back at the parked locomotive there’s a nicely-handled moment where the old train driver, accepting his fate, begins to sing a melancholy song as his carriage is swamped by vermin. This is a sweet example of how Chinese and Hong Kong movies can unexpectedly switch tone in a story and make the mood-shift work wonderfully.

Doctor Su Zhenghai, played by Yin Chao-Te, remains unwavering throughout, never allowing himself to give up, unlike most of the other characters, finally inspiring the survivors (after his daughter gives an impassioned speech) to join forces and help push a derailed carriage off the train track so that they can escape. With some scenes of self-sacrifice and the virtues of everyone working for the common good highlighted at the end, this film’s message must surely be one that the Chinese authorities wholeheartedly condone. Looking past the political box-ticking, the mix of selflessness and cooperation does work well and adds some poignancy to the finale. And probably only an Asian film would end with a main character getting overwhelmed by ravenous rodents while the camera focuses on flower blossoms in the foreground to create a zen-like moment of sadness.

If you’re willing to look past the less-than-stellar rodent special effects (they really are quite poor), RAT DISASTER is a solid merging of horror, disaster and animals-on-the-attack movies, with some on-the-nose family dramatics also blended into the genre mixture.