The films I've chosen are notable for one reason for another. Either they're severely underrated, hilarious but still great, or they're an interesting re-imagining of the genre. But, no matter which category these fall into it's time run your XBOX's double time and practice those head shots, because here is a heaping mess of zombie flicks.
Title: 28 Weeks LaterDirector: Juan Carlos Fresnadillo
Year: 2007
28 Weeks Later picks up pretty much where Danny Boyle's big quasi-zombie hit left off, but while a lot of people hailed the originality of the first one and seemed to stick their nose up at this punchier sequel, I have to say I really liked this more than the original.
Maybe it's just the lover of trash in me, the same guy who kind of prefers Aliens to Alien, given the choice. Or maybe it's that 28 Weeks Later carries some of the same ideas as the original movie, intensifies some of them, and provides a nice slab of splattery gore on top to round it out.
I guess what I'm saying is this: while my favorite thing about 28 Days Later was its inspiring portrayal of a deserted, post-apocalyptic London, and its tale of people surviving a plague of their zombie-like infected neighbors, the actual screen time for infected zombie-things versus humans is pretty fractional. It focuses more on story and character development, and the implications of the situation.
Nothing wrong with that.
Occasionally a serious attempt at dealing with the emotional states of people in realistic horror-movie circumstances is called for; however, on the second outing, I think what we all really wanted to see was more straight-up zombie movie type shit, and 28 Weeks Later doesn't fail to deliver some goods. In fact, I'd say the original 28 Days Later would probably have been much more top-notch (though perhaps less critically acclaimed) if it had had a few more pitched battles with the infected, and a few more gratuitous shots of exploding and bitten-off body parts.
That's not to say Weeks skimps on plot, and its subtext about the inherent ethical and logistical dilemmas surrounding the military occupation of one nation by another is pretty deftly dealt with, in a nicely topical (i.e. Iraq war) way. Also called into question is the notion of complete control over nature/a zone affected by a natural disaster, and over the behavior of human beings in such areas.
But really, what you really have is a lot of intense squibbing, a particularly protracted and gruesome scene that would do Fulci proud, and a helicopter sequence that rivals a similar scene in Planet Terror. Sure you have to allow for a few stretches of coincidence, but so what? Director Fresnadillo otherwise does a capable and entertaining re-visit to the world of 'the infected'.
All in all, a hit with me, so why not with you?
Title: Zombi 3 (sometimes Zombie 2)
Director: Lucio Fulci/Bruno Mattei
Year: 1988
Hah! Lucio Fulci (The Beyond, Zombi 2) and Bruno Mattei (Hell of the Living Dead)??? Directing the same film? It's almost like a dream come true, at least for those of us with a distinctive lack of taste.
Although Fulci was notoriously unhappy with the film, and left in mid-production due to a stroke (prompting assistant director Mattei to take the helm) I still think Zombi 3 is an effective, if run-of-the-mill Italian zombie flick. You have your top secret government program, your deadly chemical weapon which brings the dead back to life as flesh-eating cannibals, and your group of terrorists trying to steal said weapon, of course. You've also got your group of horny soldiers on leave having to protect a party of young people in an abandoned hotel, and your soulful disk jockey providing much-needed philosophical commentary on the ensuing zombie apocalypse...wait...what?
Yeah, who cares, really, because the dead start walking, start jumping out of crazy places, popping out of pools of water, and...well...eating folks. You got heads exploding and pregnant chicks attacked by zombies, and all kinds of other good stuff. Honestly, I like this movie just as much as I liked Zombi 2, and, honestly, as far as pacing is concerned, this one is a little more kick-ass. The zombies move a little more, making the action more intense.
I guess, if one were to draw comparisons, there's two mutually exclusive ways to elicit horror from zombies, at least according to Italian cinema: one, have them move very slowly, emphasizing the fact that they are dead, rotting, and barely sentient. The horror is part-visceral but also cerebral in that the buildup to actual violence is so slow and agonizing thus the audience is allowed to focus for longer on their own repugnance at being touched or in proximity to a moving dead thing. The resulting gore sequences from these buildups are always lingered upon in a way which is meant to disgust. This approach is dependent on a buildup of tension.
Or, you can have the zombies kick some more ass, and the horror is quite a bit more physical in nature. In other words, the audience realizes that if the characters don't move quickly themselves, these undead juggernauts of destruction will be shortly feasting on their flesh. The zombies are resistant to pain and most physical injury, only a shot to the head takes them down. They are strong and relentless in their drive for human flesh. This approach, as I've said, elicits a more physical fear, but it allows the pacing to be quite faster.
Such is the case in Zombi 3, in my opinion. It and its predecessor are just not comparable in terms of approach.
Zombi 2 was an exercise in Fulci's trademark prolonged, tortuous buildup, and was focused on the arousal of revulsion at the sight and thought of the zombies themselves. Zombi 3's approach is more visceral, more focused, in most ways, on the effects of an assault by zombies. More centered on the actual battling of the undead. So, it's pacing is faster, much more kickass.
Anyway, you've an excellent zombie attack scene involving a pregnant chick. Pretty awesome.
Recommended.
Title: Hell of the Living Dead
Director: Bruno Mattei
Year: 1980
I think most people sort of lambast this movie for its patent absurdity, or they try to enjoy it in an ironic Mystery Science Theater 3000 manner. My aforementioned lack of taste forces me to do neither. I sincerely enjoyed this film.
Director Bruno Mattei manages to make an interesting political statement about poverty, the third world, and developed nations' responsibility to the third world while avoiding the pitfall of elevating his movie to 'serious' status. In other words, it's still a trashy, over-the-top, exploitative 1980's Italian zombie flick.
One thing that people either love or hate is Mattei's unapologetic use of National Geographic stock footage. There are completely inappropriate moments in the film where characters are staring off-camera and the cut takes us to some grainy footage of a tapir drinking water from a pool, or a flock of flamingos taking off into the sky. The effect is mostly ridiculous, but if you find it humorous, or, like me, genuinely like animals and nature footage in general, it's almost like Mattei is providing something for everyone, albeit in a shamelessly cheap way.
You've also got some ridiculous moments of female nudity, especially the infamous 'nude anthropology' scene which I won't divulge in any more detail. Suffice to say, Hell may or may not have its tongue firmly in cheek, but the utter absurdity of the entire sequence is something I fully appreciated (it is, after all, an Italian movie). Even this sequence isn't free of the overabundance of stock footage hi-jacked for the film, as most of the 'native' sequences appear to be stock, although there were a few parts where the transition is a little more seamless and I didn't see the culmination, as it were, coming.
Of course, I should touch on most peoples' reason for watching this: the zombies and the gore. The zombies are pretty standard fare. With the exception of the fact that most of them are supposed to be Papua New Guinea natives, they pretty much resemble your typical Romero zombies from the previous year's Dawn of the Dead. The gore is great though. The excellent head-popping, the biting and feasting sequences, the zombie rat at the beginning, and, of course, the OVER. THE. FUCKING. TOP. ending are not to be missed.
Fight Club this is not. And to me, that's all the more reason to watch.
Title: Dead Heat
Director: Mark Goldblatt
Year: 1988
Mark Goldblatt is better known for his editing work on movies like The Terminator, Predator 2, Starship Troopers etc. Dead Heat is one of his few forays into directing, and I wish he would have made some other attempts.
This late 80's flick is billed as an action-horror-comedy. But unlike many alleged multi-genre flicks, which tend to focus on avoiding alienating any particular audience and so please none of the audience, this one manages--effortlessly--to actually BE a horror film, and a buddy-cop comedy, and a straight up action flick all at once. How? Let's break it down, bit by bit.
First, how is Dead Heat a comedy? Well, I guess, for starters, the premise is pretty funny: deceased criminals brought back to life as ultra-violent and uber-hard-to-kill zombies who continue their lives of crime. Your main characters are two rogue cops, played by Treat Williams and...Joe Fucking Piscopo. They have to take down these zombie criminals, which usually results in a whole lot destruction, and said zombies dying, messily, a second time. Also, both cops are eventually killed and resurrected by the very 'resurrection machine' at the center of the film, which makes for even more hilarious antics and death puns.
At the same time, Dead Heat plays on the overt action elements of the buddy-cop genre to produce some nice stunt sequences and some cool 1980's gun play. And Treat Williams and Piscopo are pretty seamless as far as moving between ironic or darkly humorous dialogue and more hard-boiled fare.
And lastly, for horror, we have fucking zombies. The special effects are great, with many of them being downright gruesome. In fact, I think one of the reasons that this film either turned off or was straight up overlooked by a lot of people is the fact that it goes all the way with each of its genre claims. The effects don't skimp on the gross-out, the blood, or the gore. In fact, one part manages to wade into the territory of slap-stick gore, a la Dead Alive, during an infamous sequence taking place in a chinese restaurant. But overall, the effect of the two cops' deterioration throughout the course of the movie, and crazy special effects manage to make Dead Heat a little more serious and stomach-turning than I think people were expecting it to be.
Because of its sheer schizophrenic genre treatment, and its cast (which included a near-final appearance by Vincent Price), you'd think Dead Heat had the cult film formula down; but sadly this is probably one of the more obscure gems of the late 1980's. If you liked Return of the Living Dead, have a taste for Lethal Weapon and 48 Hours, and just generally enjoy zombies, guns, cops, car crashes, exploding bodies, and slowly-decaying protagonists, then Dead Heat should satisfy.
No comments:
Post a Comment