Zombie Nosh [Flesheater: Revenge Of The Living Dead]

This Halloween I watched an amateur drama school rendition of Night Of The Living Dead, but at least it actually took place on Halloween night.

#Alive

Did it do anything new? No, not really. Did it do the old stuff well? Yeah, it did actually. Did it need to do something new? Um, yeah it probably did.

Little Monsters

A bit too light hearted for the zombie crowd, bit too much inventive swearing for the light hearted crowd.

Flight Of The Living Dead: Outbreak On A Plane [Plane Dead]

Cheap shit about zombies on a plane something something, don’t care, it was fucking awful.

Army Of The Dead

Snyder once again pushes everything in the film to the maximum. Unfortunately when your film is mostly made up of soul crushingly weak dialogue, lazy characterisation and a zombie horde that looks like an experimental dance troupe interpreting Jurassic Park 3 then pushing everything to the maximum is a pretty poor idea.

Dawn Of The Dead: The Argento Cut [Zombie]

Fascinating insight into how editing and score can affect a movie. It would appear that rather than fiddle with Romero’s cut, Dario Argento has assembled this from original elements which means despite the fact this is exactly the same Dawn Of The Dead, it feels like a completely different film with alternate takes, dialogue and score used throughout. Most interesting is that it no longer feels like a Romero movie, despite the fact that it is.

Anna And The Apocalypse

Teenagers belting out saccharine eighties power pop numbers during a zombie apocalypse should be something I hate but the sheer conviction in mashing together two disparate genres whilst insistently making zero concession to either makes this a joy.

Lifeforce [Space Vampires]

Begins with one of the finest Lovecraft style investigations of an alien environment put to screen, managing to accurately portray the immensity and gargantuan awe of such a discovery. Then the tale moves back to earth and becomes more focussed on a naked lady and science fiction interpretations of vampire myth, until it all just gives up and goes with zombies instead. A mess with aspirations.

Burial Ground [Le notti del terrore/ Nights Of Terror]

Fucking awful Italian zombie shit, the scariest bit being when a 13 year old boy, played by a man with dwarfism who’s clearly in his mid twenties, tries to shag his mum.

Eat, Brains, Love

(Frightfest Day 4)
So droll and laid back I almost forgot it was a film, and by the end I think the film itself forgot this too. Which was fine, i just liked hanging out with it for a bit.

The Dead Don't Die

Both a love letter to Romero's original Night and a flippant dissection of modern zombie cinema all delivered absolutely deadpan at a glacial pace. Loved it.

Rampant [Chang-gwol]

If the fucking awful, dodgy, knock off subtitling is the most notable thing about a movie, something's gone wrong.
Also had a similar running into a room, hitting stuff and then lots of jumping vibe previously seen in Turkish Star Wars.

Silent Night, Zombie Night

An utterly failed attempt at being both a Christmas movie and a half decent zombie movie. And it's set during the day, not at night.

One Cut Of The Dead [Kameru o tomeru na!]

(Frightfest Day 2)
Begins with a 37 minute shot, and then goes on to do something very clever with it for the rest of the movie. I really did not expect to be laughing as hard as I was. Superb.

The Night Eats The World [La nuit a dévoré le monde]

A shift of focus from the usual zombie apocalypse carnage to an existential study of a lone survivor who decides to just sit it out. It turns out that surviving is boring, needs more carnage.

Phantasm III: Lord Of The Dead

Ice cream man loses an adult that acts like a child but finds a child who acts like an adult, a woman who doesn't want to know and a friendly ball/dead brother. Then everybody gets involved in a massive zombie fight with a fuck-ton of killer spheres dangling about and The Tall Man intensely staring at things before it all collapses in an absolutely batshit lunatic ending. May well be my favourite so far.

Seoul Station [Seoulyeok]

Animated running zombies who, even in cartoon form, were effective enough of a threat that they made me painfully aware how shit everybody in the movie was at closing doors.

The End? [In un giorno la fine]

(Frightfest Day 4)
Just as you're asking yourself if there's anything new to be said with zombie cinema? Along comes this with a firm resounding 'no, not really.'

Dead Shack

(Frightfest Day 2)
Sweary Joe Dante.

It Stains The Sands Red

Sets up a fantastic original zombie premise, gets a bit silly with it and then completely gives up attempting, instead, to shove an entirely different unoriginal movie into the last twenty minutes.