Split Second is a 1992 American-British science fiction horror film directed by Tony Maylam and Ian Sharp. Rutger Hauer stars as a burnt-out police detective obsessively hunting down the mysterious serial killer that killed his partner several years prior. The film also features Kim Cattrall, Alastair Neil Duncan, Pete Postlethwaite, Ian Dury, and Alun Armstrong.
Split Second | |
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Theatrical release poster | |
Directed by |
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Produced by | Laura Gregory |
Written by | Gary Scott Thompson |
Starring |
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Music by |
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Cinematography | Clive Tickner |
Edited by | Dan Rae |
Production company |
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Distributed by | InterStar (US) |
Release date |
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Running time | 90 minutes |
Country |
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Language | English |
Budget | $7 million |
Box office | US$5.4 million |
Screenplay
This section needs expansion. You can help by adding to it. (September 2014) |
In the year 2008, global warming and heavy rainfall has left large areas of London flooded. Rookie police officer Dick Durkin is assigned to partner with Harley Stone, a burnt-out and highly cynical veteran homicide detective who, according to his commanding officer, survives on "anxiety, coffee, and chocolate" after being unable to prevent the death of his partner by a serial killer 10 years previously. Now, the murders have begun again and the two detectives are assigned to this case. After investigating the scenes of several killings, they appear no closer to identifying the killer. Their only clues being that the murders seem to be linked to the lunar cycle, and that the killer has multiple recombinant DNA strands, having absorbed the DNA of its victims.
Finally, after Stone's girlfriend, Michelle, is kidnapped, the detectives track the killer deep into the flooded and disused London Underground system and discover the truth: the killer is not human. It's a horrific and possibly demonic creature that is fast, savage, bloodthirsty, and fixated upon killing Stone just as it previously killed his partner. In fact, as the movie progresses, each killing and "appearance" of the monster is an attempt to lure Stone closer and closer.
During a tense battle in and around an abandoned underground train, Michelle is found suspended over the water as bait, but Stone is able to pull the monster's heart from its chest and kill it. However, as the policemen leave the scene with Michelle in a rescue dinghy, bubbles of air are seen breaking the surface of the water, suggesting that there may be more than one monster.
- Rutger Hauer as Harley Stone
- Kim Cattrall as Michelle
- Neil Duncan as Dick Durkin
- Michael J. Pollard as The Rat Catcher
- Alun Armstrong as Thrasher
- Pete Postlethwaite as Paulsen
- Ian Dury as Jay Jay
- Roberta Eaton as Robin
- Tony Steedman as O'Donnell
- Steven Hartley as Foster
- Sara Stockbridge as Tiffany
Screenwriter Gary Scott Thompson wrote the original script titled Pentagram in 1988. Although Thompson's script got him some more jobs in Hollywood, it wasn't picked up until a few years later. Laura Gregory, producer and head of Challenge Films, and production manager Susan Nicoletti discovered the script and thought it had great potential. They hired Tony Maylam to direct the film. However, they wanted Thompson to make some changes to the script. His script was an action, horror, and buddy cop film with occult overtones which took place in modern-day Los Angeles. It included a ritualistic serial killer who has committed five kills every five years for the last quarter of the century, and always leaves pentagram symbols after each murder. One of the reasons why changes were demanded is because the script was considered to be too similar to another horror thriller which came out around the same time, The First Power (1990). Thompson changed the script during re-writes and his new version of it, titled Black Tide, was very close to the final film. It was set in a futuristic London which has been flooded due to the effects of global warming. This new version of the script was send to Rutger Hauer who loved it and agreed to star in the film. Though Thompson originally wrote the script with Harrison Ford in mind for the main role, he was happy that Hauer was cast as the lead.
During production, the script kept getting changed. There were lot of discussions about what the main villain/creature should look like and what exactly it would be, which is why Stephen Norrington had only three weeks to design the creature. The ending also kept getting changed. Thompson was re-writing it during filming. Hauer told him to re-write the script to make it more physical and with more focus on the psychic link that his character has with the creature. Due to all the stress during production, Maylam stepped back from finishing the film so Ian Sharp and others involved in the film joined up to finish it. Sharp directed the finale which takes place in a flooded subway along with some other additional scenes, which is why he's credited as co-director in ending credits. The movie was filmed in eight weeks, between June 17 and August 9 of 1991, and was widely released in April 1992. Although it was re-titled again sometime during production from Black Tide into Split Second, the movie still had several different titles in other countries, like Killer Instinct (in France) and Detective Stone (in Italy). Despite an exciting ad campaign and good word of mouth, the movie underperformed at the box office because it was released during the Los Angeles riots.
Wendy Carlos, who composed the scores for A Clockwork Orange (1971), The Shining (1980) and Tron (1982), was hired to compose the score for Split Second, but her score was rejected and it was changed with new score by Francis Haines and Stephen W. Parsons. Couple tracks from Carlos' rejected score were included on her compilations album Rediscovering Lost Scores, Volume 2, both tracks were going to be used in the morgue scene.
Some scenes were deleted from the film. There was a Japanese VHS version which had a couple of deleted scenes which were put back in the film. In the first one, Stone and Durkin go to Durkin's place where he talks to his girlfriend Robin (played by actress Roberta Eaton, who is still credited in the film even though her scene was deleted). Another extra scene has some more dialogue between Stone and Durkin, which included the "monster" killing a jogger and ripping his heart out. Stone and Durkin find the man's body right after. These extra scenes are included as bonus features on Blu-Ray of the film released by 101 Films.
This section needs expansion. You can help by adding to it. (February 2018) |
Lawrence Cohn of Variety wrote, "Split Second is an extremely stupid monster film, boasting enough violence and special effects to satisfy less-discriminating vid fans." Chris Willman of the Los Angeles Times wrote, "It's hard to think of a less satisfying creature feature in recent memory than the simply terrible Split Second." Stephen Holden of The New York Times called it "fairly dull". Doug Brod of Entertainment Weekly called it "utterly soulless and imitative". In Time Out London, Nigel Floyd wrote, "This derivative eco-horror movie recycles dozens of disposable plots".
Belgian grindcore band Aborted used an image from the film for their first album's cover The Purity of Perversion (1999).