Zombie Self-Defense Force

OK, it’s probably about time for some mental Japanese zombie horror. Having recently gone through a phase of watching Japan-o-gore movies, none of which were Zombie films (Meatball Machine, Machine Girl and the awesome Tokyo Gore Police) I felt it about time I dive into some Japanese Zombie gore, and this wierd little number fit the bill perfectly.

I shall start this review with some choice words summing up the film : cheap, gory, psycho zombie-baby, cyborg and a space octopus. Now, that’s gotta get your attention, surely. Space Octopus?

Opening up with some CGI so awful that my GF sat for about 1 minute of the film before heading straight to bed moaning that she’s never seen such cheap CGI in all her life – and I’m almost inclined to agree – ZSDF kicks into the live-action in a forest somewhere, and we meet a few pockets of nefarious weirdos all separately going about their business. Such business includes some drug addicted Yakuza burying one of their victims, a group of army types on a training exercise, a J-pop starlet on a photo shoot and a sleazy husband breaking up with his pregnant mistress.

All these parties see a crude CGI flying saucer flying overhead, which crash-land somewhere in the forest emitting a bizarre green-glow of radiation. Obviously this strange gas thing has the side effect of reanimating the dead, and the remaining people meet up while running from the undead and seek refuge in a local bed and breakfast place.

Holed up in this venue with the undead knocking at the windows and the humans slowly succumbing to the zombie virus we get treated to loads of excellent low-budget gore (the best kind of gore hands down), a fantastically mental zombie-baby going on the rampage and the transformation of one of the characters from confused human to badass robot-cyborg. And then there is the aforementioned Space Octopus. Yes, (s)he only gets a screen time of about 2 seconds but it was the highlight of this bizarre cheapo gorefest.

An original film? Well, not particularly. Cutting-edge effects? Certainly not. Plot, script and storyline? Hell no. But bizarre comedy and loads of gore? Why yes please.

Gore Score B+
Norks Score F
Originality Score C-
Overall Score B-

 

Tokyo Zombie

Also posted at http://www.revenantmagazine.com/)

Regular readers of this blog will know that I have a particular soft spot for Japanese Zombie movies. Stacy, Bio-zombie, Junk – all have some bizarre yet awesome quality. Tokyo Zombie certainly falls into this category, albeit being less of a horror and more of a comedy than the others in their camp.

Fujio and Mitsuo are a pair of slackers who spend most of their time practicing their Jiu Jitsu rather than getting on with their jobs, whatever that may be. They are interrupted in the middle of some martial-arts action by their boss, who naturally doesn’t take too kindly to these shenanigans. A small tussle erupts between the two guys and the boss and he ‘accidently’ gets knocked over the head with a fire extinguisher. Instead of reporting this incident to the police the decide the best course of action is to take the body and bury it up Black Fuji, the nearby garbage pile where everyone dumps their unwanted goods and relatives.

Naturally being a Zombie movie this is the point where the dead bodies buried here decide to return to life and chomp on the local residents. Using their impressive Jiu Jitsu skills these two friends fight their way to their van and embark on a road trip toward Russia, because obviously that’s where the real men go.

While not really a Horror movie (although it does have more than its fair share of decapitations) Tokyo Zombie is more of a buddy comedy film, with the two friends joking, wrestling and arguing with each other for the majority of the time they are together on screen. That isn’t a particularly long time however, as one of the two meets an unfortunate end following a kidnapping of a young lady, and the other is forced to take this lass as his, er, wife. This is where the film switches from a Zombie Outbreak film to a Zombie Aftermath one, as we get to see what happens to the survivors of the zombie plague once everyone else is mostly dead. (Apparently the world becomes much like Romero’s Land of the Dead.)

It was certainly an enjoyable movie, although it could have done with more zombies. And more Tokyo too, to be honest. Still, there is some pretty impressive Jiu Jitsu, some slapstick farcical comedy and the odd bit of gore here and there. Plus it was good to see a film that covered 2 different eras of zombie outbreak – the before and after. It’s just a pity that the ‘after’ section was pretty barren of both laughs and plot.

Gore Score C
Norks Score F
Originality Score B-
Overall Score C+

 

Evil (To kako)

Also posted at http://www.revenantmagazine.com/)

Greek horror is not something I am particularly familiar with, but when such a situation presents itself you can – more often than not – count on Zombie Cinema to fill that gap. Undead movies can be found on almost all continents of the globe (i’m still waiting for those lazy penguins to get their act together and knock up a scary movie or two) with Europe a decidedly proficient area.

The makers of this gorefest have obviously seen many of them, as it’s cliche ridden from start to finish. Not that this is a bad thing however, as when would anyone complain about bodies ripped in half Capt Rhodes style, or too many eye gouges?! However, there is one thing that is lacking here, and that is the plot.

Some cavers have are exploring an uncharted grotto somewhere near Athens and uncover a mysterious ’something’ which apparently causes memory loss and delayed zombism, although we have no idea what this something is. These adventurers manage to get themselves out the cave and back home with no knowledge of how they got there.

The 3 of them then about their regular lives – going to a soccer match, going clubbing and eating dinner with their family. This is where the outbreak occurs as these 3 guys transform into flesh-eaters and devour those around them. We get to see a great scene where the soccer attendee turns to his neighbour and bites him, then turns around to the guy on his other side to do the same, while the first victim then turns to his neighbour to start feasting – it would have been a fantastic sight to have stuck with this view as the whole crowd turn on each other, but we are quickly and unsatisfactorily transferred to another outbreak elsewhere.

We are now at the stage of full outbreak, as a few survivors around the city try to escape and hide from the oncoming horde, while fighting off whichever zombie comes their way. Basically, this is what happens for the rest of the film. Survivors hide, do a bit of arguing, run away and beat up some zombies. There’s no character exploration, no real tension, but oh, is there plenty of gore! Heads explode, limbs rip off, and eyes are punctured with pure Peter Jackson glee.

This goes on until the final climactic scene – which was certainly a highlight – as we are treated to a overhead shot of zombies engulfing the city. This is not the only interesting directorial choice, as the film is riddled with 24-style split screens and picture-in-picture effects. It’s all good fun to watch, plenty of gore, but due to the lack of any real point it is ultimately a fun, if unsatisfying ride.

Gore Score A
Norks Score F
Originality Score D
Overall Score C-

 

Exhumed

Also posted at http://www.revenantmagazine.com/)

So there I was, sat in a crummy hotel room in London on my own on the ‘lavish’ single bed with the TV’s On-Screen Program Guide covering up the whole picture so I can only hear the sound in the background. Oh well, why not get some wine in and watch the only DVD I have with me on my laptop. ‘Exhumed’. It turns out that I should have chosen to watch the static program guide instead, to be honest.

Exhumed is a turgid anthology of semi-zombie horror. 3 totally random episodes with nothing in common apart from a bizarre cobbled-together ending that pretends to tie the stories together. Firstly there is the dull story about some Japanese dude and a monk wandering in a forest looking for some artifact that can bring the dead back to life. Luckily it’s all in Japanese which masks how bad the acting really is, but it was far from classic – The fight scenes and the looks into camera were pretty dire. There are a few zombies dotted around the forest who get killed off, but there are no scares or even any excitement.

Secondly is a strange black and white noir-style film, which features some of the most appalling acting I have ever seen. It follows the adventure of some private detective lass who joins a seedy club to investigate a missing persons case, I believe. However I spent most of this section of the film with my jaw on the floor amazed at just how terrible the performances actually were while knocking back the wine that I missed out on most of the excitement, if there was any. Seriously, it was like watching a children’s school play rehearsal.

Long after my interest had faded into nothingness came the 3rd in the anthology. It seems to be set in the future with some vampires and werewolves fighting about something-or-other. This is the episode with some actual gore, but it was so amateur in it’s execution and I was so bored at this time that I couldn’t care less about any of it. Even when the chainsaw is brought out to slice up some fake body-parts I was thinking of turning this abomination off. However I stuck it out and was mildly amused when the vampire : werewolf lesbian scene kicked off, but it wasn’t enough keep me entertained and I turned the film off and curled up in the small hotel bed.

I did watch most of the final scene the next day on my train home, but was so embarrased to be seen watching it in public that I switched it off and went surfing for porn instead.

Gore Score D
Norks Score C-
Originality Score D
Overall Score F

 

Choking Hazard

Also posted at http://www.revenantmagazine.com/)

I can count the number of Czech films I’ve ever seen on the fingers of one stumpy fingerless hand. Well that would equate to zero, whereas actually I mean one. This film to be precise.  Naturally this makes it both the best and the worst Czech film I’ve ever seen, and in the grand scale of zombie movies this rates somewhere… in the middle.

A bunch of students shack up in a mostly abandoned hotel to discuss the meaning of life. Bizarrely a Porn Star / Jehovah’s Witness dude rocks on up at the motel by accident and gets wrapped up in all the metaphysical discussions, although I don’t recall him ever discussing how he can be both a Porn star and a Jehovah Witness at the same time. But hey, at least he seems passionate about both lifestyles.

Anyway, the film is not particularly scary, there is not much gore, and the nudity is also below par.  So what’s left?  Well the actual story, direction and plot are actually pretty decent. There are plenty of unusual scenes going on here – such as the electroshock zombie dance – which is as ludicrous as it is entertaining.  In fact the whole film is like that.  It’s pretty bizarre, nothing makes much sense, but it’s quite enjoyable none-the-less.  Nobody involved seems too bothered that Zombies have started attacking everyone, there are no reasons given for this outbreak, and nobody is remotely concerned about what will happen after this whole hotel zombie affair has ended.

Also I seem to have missed out on the philosophical viewpoints in this film, probably because I watched the (Czech language subtitled in English) film late at night and had a fair few glasses of wine inside me, but apparently the point is that the Religious get their heads bashed in while the Nihilists get to copulate with numerous ladies while filming it on portable cameras.  Well, that seems fair enough.  There were other worldviews on offer but I guess they weren’t as memorable.  I did like the zombie with a massive saucepan on his head that had a smiley face drawn on the front, but I don’t know what that means.  Probably something to do with Communism.

Gore Score C
Norks Score D
Originality Score D
Overall Score C

 

They Came Back

AKA Les Revenants

While many people view the zombie genre as pure low-brow trash all the way, those of us in-the-know are well aware that there is a lot more to the undead than just gore and nudity. Sadly, this pretentious French number is in the latter category, with not a trashy gore shot in sight, and nudity that is far too tasteful and ‘relevant to the plot’. Urgh.

‘They Came Back’ chronicles an unexplained phenomenon in a French city when those who have died within the last 10 years return back, and the effect this has on those they had originally left behind. Although there are hundreds of these recently deceased the story focuses on 3 of these characters – a young boy, a 30-something man and a crusty old lady. These dead chaps, along with all the other zombies are held in a refugee asylum-type building by the city council until the relatives come to collect them. The parents of the young boy come for him at some point, but the ex-wife of the gent isn’t too bothered so he just potters around and eventually decides to go back to work at what appears to be the town planning department. The old lady seems to belong to the city mayor or something, but he too isn’t too excited about her coming back either.

After a (long) while and plenty of council meetings it emerges these dead people are, predictably, pretty rubbish at more or less everything, which is a shame because the families of these people seem to be getting attached to them again. Actually, one thing the dead are reasonably good at is escaping their relatives in the middle of the night and going for meetings with each other. They’re all planning an excursion out to an unmentioned place, presumably back where they came from. How will the relatives that have just come to terms with the returners cope with this upheaval? Well the answer to that question, as well as all the others thrown up in this movie is… whatever you want.

Everything is so open to interpretation it makes the film almost meaningless. There is no discussion as to how the families actually feel about their relatives coming back from the dead, nor how they felt about them while they were still alive. There is no comment made about the relationships between the relatives of each of the returnees, and no analysis of death itself. The whole film seems structured to leave every possible question open to the viewer to decide. If the film makers didn’t have anything to actually say about death then why make the film in the first place?

It would have been better to concentrate on one of the families and the relationship between those still alive and the actual impact that the dead relatives’ re-appearance has on their whole lives, rather that the endless council meetings and irrelevant scientific discussions about body-temperature.

Gore Score F
Norks Score D
Originality Score B
Overall Score C-

 

The Night Of The Seagulls

AKA Blind Dead IV

Also posted at http://www.revenantmagazine.com/)

It’s about time I complete the quadrilogy of Ossorio zombie\mummy\skeleton\vampire movies, with the final film in the series – Night Of The Seagulls.  The box set has been calling out for me to finish it off and now is as good a time as any, particularly as I have been viewing mostly modern zombie horrors of late and feel the need to delve back in time.

Having been rather disappointed, albeit mildly amused by the last film The Ghost Galleon, Ossorio was back on form with his last Blind Dead film.  Starting out more-or-less the same as his previous efforts with a flashback to the days of the original Templars and their dastardly acts – again involving kidnapping a young lady, ripping off her top and cutting out her heart to drink the blood.  However here they are feeding the heart to a goblin-fish looking statue for some in-explained reason, presumably involving everlasting life.

Cue present day, and a freshfaced GP and his wife are moving into a scummy fishing village to start up as the GP for the local residents, but receive a rather hostile welcome.  It turns out that outsiders are not particularly welcome, probably because the villagers have a tendency to sacrifice their young women every 7 years to the Templars (who are now just skeletons residing in the massive nearby castle).  Apparently every 7 years 7 women have to be sacrificed over 7 nights otherwise the Blind Dead horsemen will rampage through the village slaughtering the population.  How the villagers discovered this was necessary is beyond me though, the Templars can’t speak or do anything other than ride horses and chop up ladies.  Maybe they clubbed together to write a threatening letter to the village laying out their plans?  Who knows.

Anyway, the doctor and his good wife discover what is going on thanks to the local village mong who spills the secret to them.  Naturally they feel this is a bit of a bad situation so they go and investigate which surprisingly causes the Templars to get a bit miffed, who then attack the whole village.

Almost all aspects of the Blind Dead series are present and correct.  Zombie skeletons rising from the tombs, slow stalking of  victims, chained up women with their norks on show, and the horsemen riding in slow-motion through the surrounding scenery.  However one aspect that is missing is the creepy music that used to accompany the templars rising up and riding out on the hunt.  This sadly means that the film seems more daft and while still atmospheric it is lacking the chill factor of the first 2 films.

Still, there is enough going on here to ensure that the series ended on a much better note than if Ossorio had stopped after the bizarre 3rd film, and it gives me the appetite to go back to the first film to remind myself how the series begin. However as a stand alone film it’s just too remeniscent of the (at the time quite recent) Wicker Man to be truly original.

Gore Score D
Norks Score C-
Originality Score D
Overall Score D+

 

The Ghost Galleon

(Also posted at http://www.revenantmagazine.com/)AKA Horror Of The Zombies

Yeah, mid-way through another well deserved week off work but the only Zombie film i’ve managed to get through is this number, the 3rd in the Blind Dead quadrilogy.  I really should try harder.  Well, there are still several days left to fill with zombie crud!

The Ghost Galleon – When even the box of a film says it is considered a ’surprising’ film warning bells should really start to sound.  Whereas the first 2 Blind Dead films take place around atmospheric ruined medieval cities this particular entry involves an obviously fake miniature galleon ship, which I assume we are supposed to believe is a full size vessel.

A couple of bikini-clad ladies involved in some marketing scam of some sort are left adrift in a little powerboat for about a month apparently, and although they do not seem to have any supplies on-board they seem perfectly happy, spending their time chatting on their radio to their bosses on the shore somewhere.  However a mysterious fog from another dimension sweeps over them and they crash into the ghostly galleon.  Sensibly, one of the ladies decides that an abandoned and ancient rotting sailboat is a better place to wait out the rescue, so she climbs aboard never to be seen again, (although we do hear her screaming for a bit).  Her girly companion decided to remain on the smaller boat and doesn’t hear the screaming, but then still decides to go aboard to investigate later.

Oh yes, the Templar knights are aboard this boat for some reason. In traditional Blind Dead style they spend 10 minutes slowly rising from their coffins before slowly chasing the girl around the ship.  That’s pretty much it.  Her friends and boss from the shore do fly out to the ship to try to find them and manage to locate the inter-dimensional galleon, but it all ends badly for most of them as you would expect.

I don’t really want to spoil the ending here, but the ship burns down and the survivors float to shore, although the Zombie have followed them…  Actually, that was the ending.  Still, this review makes it sound like slightly more happens in this movie than really does.  Zombies slowly chase women.  Women die.  Ship burns.  People escape.  Zombies escape too, ready for film number 4.

Easily the most boring entry into the series so far (i’m yet to see #4 though).  The gore is practically non-existent, there are no norks on show despite the overabundance of bikini clad ladies, and the plot is equally as desolate.  Still, it’s always good to see  Skeletor and friends in action, and the film did keep me watching for some reason.  I just wonder if the final film finishes the series on a high.

Gore Score D
Norks Score F
Originality Score C
Overall Score C-

 

Versus

(Also posted at http://www.revenantmagazine.com/)

I love my Asian zombie films.  Junk and Bio-zombie were reasonably decent if rather cliched, while Wild Zero and Stacy were full on classics.  Then there is Versus – a Zombie film I’ve had on my shelf for some time now waiting for an appropriate time-slot for viewing.  Well, that time arrived the other day after our guests had left the house for the night and my housemate and I were sat wondering what to watch that would suit our alcohol content.  (ie lots of wine\cider).

After the standard battle we usually have with foreign language DVDs (spoken language with subtitles or dubbed into English? – we went the subtitle route) we chilled out ready to enjoy some zombie fighting action.  Well, what we got was a whole film of choreographed gun battles and martial arts, with a few token zombie thrown into the mix.  The story is tosh – some nameless gang dudes kidnap another nameless woman and meet an escaped (nameless) prisoner in a forest.  The prisoner and woman escape into the trees just as the living dead (who have been buried there by the aforementioned gang) return to life.  Now we have loads of gunshots, fights and cool slow-mo posing for the entirety of the film.  Sure, the fights are pretty cool and some of the gunfights are well put together, but that is all that goes on for about 2 hours.  It got so repetitive that my housemate fell asleep and started snoring by the end of it. 

Not that this was a bad film, it was just more John Woo than George Romero, with not nearly enough originality or zombie gut munching to satisfy me.  Maybe I was just expecting a different sort of film, an I may enjoy it on a martial arts gunfight action level next time I watch it.  Oh well, I think I’ll just go watch ‘Stacy’ again instead.

Gore Score C
Norks Score F
Originality Score D
Overall Score C

 

Wild Zero

(Also posted at http://www.revenantmagazine.com/)

It seems like gig season is returning to England, as in the last few weeks I’ve been to a music festival for a weekend and followed that up with a gig in London.  I have also picked up tickets for several forthcoming concerts in the next few weeks.  All this music could interfere with my Zombie watching, but luckily I have found a way to seamlessly merge the two.  This comes in the form of Drumwolf, Basswolf and Guitarwolf in the bizarre Japanese film Wild Zero.

Man alive, this film has everything.  Exploding Heads, Lazer eye Beams, UFOs, Zombies, Electic Shock Plectrums, Men in Hotpants, Mute Transexuals, Undead Romance and of course Guitar Wolf: The self proclaimed coolest band in the world, and any band who self proclaims such a thing must be pretty rock and roll.

The film follows ‘Ace’, a huge Guitar Wolf fan as he treks across the country following the band.  He accidentally saves them from being fired (literally) by their manager and as a result the band make him a blood brother and give him a special whistle which will call the band to him should he get into trouble.  Naturally trouble does follow, in the form of a UFO invasion and the dead returning to life for some reason.  Possibly these are just a coincidence as nothing is ever really explained here.  So these Zombies go on the rampage, Guitar Wolf are summoned and they all use the power of Rock and Roll to destroy all the zombies and save the planet.  Just your average story really.  Along the way we meet a transsexual who doesn’t speak or really do anything, (although Ace still falls for her), an arms dealer woman who showers with a gun (which turned out to be quite handy for when zombies invade her bathroom), a gig promoter in the tightest little hot pants I’ve ever seen a grown man wear, and a guitar that doubles as a samurai sword sheath, ideal for chopping up passing spaceships.

The Zombies themselves are plentiful, and are either made on the cheap, or are direct homages to the bluegreen zombies from the original Dawn of the Dead.  Most of these creatures are destroyed by a simple bullet to the face, causing their entire head to explode.  This happens countless times, but is always comical and welcome.

It is basically just an extended music video for the awesome band Guitar Wolf, and their music and live performances were so superb here that after watching the movie I immediately went and bought one of their albums.  A delirious mess of nonsense, volume, distortion and some Rock and Roll thrown in for good measure, just like the film.

Utterly ludicrous as only Japanese Zombie films can be, and all the more enjoyable for it.  Bonus points should be awarded for the Drinking Game built into the DVD – every time someone combs their hair, says “Rock and Roll” or a head explodes a drink icon appears on screen as a cue for you to take a swig.  Man, if I’d have been playing along I’d have been blootered in the first 10 minutes!

Gore Score B
Norks Score C
Originality C
Overall Score B+