Resident Evil (2002) -review by the Director

Based on the popular video, probably the most successful video game to movie adaptation ever made Resident Even is a survival horror movie like the game.

A multimillion dollar research company built under Raccoon city has an accident. The super computer called the Red Queen locks down the underground facility as the workers exposed to the T-Virus become flesh craving zombies. Terror and thrills ensue.

Oh Milla:

Milla Jovovich owns this movie as our protagonist Alice. Alice wakes up in the shower with her memory partly erased. She finds herself in a mansion in the country. The mansion is simply a cover for the entrance to the ‘Hive’ the underground complex owned by the umbrella corporation. The movie starts off there. A special military group is scent down to investigate, not knowing what they are walking into. The soldiers are lead by One (Colin Salmon) and includes the kick ass Rain (Michelle Rodriguez). Alice joins them as they head down to find and gain control of the Red Queen A.I. super computer.

The movie moves at a swift pace. The action races. Its violent, even gory. The zombies in the movie are more like infected people not so much the walking corpses yet, since this has all recently gone down. Besides zombies the group comes in contact with genetic freaks, like attack dogs and a creature from the video game called the Licker.

Alice is a trained special forces agent too. As she gains her memory through brief and hazy flashbacks that she is also part of this elite special forces group guarding the Hive. Her unparalleled skills keep her alive and are pure eye candy. Not only is Alice beautiful the camera loves her. She is a blast to watch in all her scenes. Especially the ones where she is fighting.

The movie sports great visuals and tense action sequences.

Acting: Milla Jovovich is fantastic. You can tell she gives her all in every scene. She is a joy to watch in all the Resident Evil movies. I’m pretty sure she does a fair amount of her stunts. She looks amazing it her outfit. A red dress with black bike shorts and long black boots. She wheres a leather jacket in the second half of the movie. I couldn’t get enough of her.

Michelle Rodriguez show off her talents in her type casted bad ass girl role. Colin Salmon (One) sweats cool and makes a great team leader, playing down his role but ramping the intensity. His dialogue comes to life in his cool, deep, polished voice.

There is no comic relief in this movie, only Eric Mabius as Matt the reporter trying to sneak in and get the scope on the dirty secrets the Umbrella corporation has up their corporate sleeve.

Gore:

We get chopped off heads, gun shots, gashes, bites, zombie transformation, sliced to death by laser beams (very cool).

Nudity:

Its quick but its hot. Milla shows all the goods here. A tit scene in the shower and at the end of the movie in a very scanty hospital gown you can, if you don’t blink, catch a glimpse of her trim.

Directing:

Paul W.S. Anderson no stranger to big hollywood action thrillers, helms this flick and he doesn’t miss a beat. The film is brilliantly paced and a wonderful watch. It goes down like your favorite meal. Great composition, pacing, action sequences, and use of slow-motion. He even throws in some creepy boo-scares.

Final thought:

Resident Evil is a joy to watch. If by some chance you never saw it do yourself a huge favor and add it to your DVD collection. Its so good its re-watchable. I’ve seen the movie several times and it never gets old. Movies this good come out only once or twice a year. To sum up the highlights. Millia Jovoich eating up the screen with her gorgeous Russian eyes leaving you hungry more. A nice group of combatants including Colin Salmon and Michelle Rodrigeuz in their best type-casted roles, tough guy bad asses.Awesome visuals, action, zombie battles, a few subtle twists, a good ending, and Paul Anderson’s skilled directing.

-The Director

Zombieland (2012) review by the Director

 

Here we go again:

Columbus Ohio (Jessie Eisenberg) a young anti-social yet happy go lucky guy finds himself in a zombie apocalypse. He makes clever rules, which he writes down, and carefully follows.

These rules are repeated throughout the movie on the screen. Columbus hooks up with Tallahassee (Woody Harrelson) who is a roughneck natural zombie slayer. Columbus cracks observational humor throughout the movie, which sometimes annoys Tallahassee yet amuses him enough to stick with the ‘scrony little spitfire.’

Zombieland:

After a great intro of crazy zombie shenanigans…

Tallahassee, who names everyone after the city they come from meets Columbus.

Tallahassee and Columbus raid a super market in search for Twinkies, Tallahassee’s favorite treat, which reminds him of life before it went to crap.

After butchering all the Zombies in the store they hear a little girl crying for help. That is when the two meet up with anti-heroes Wichita (Emma Stone) and Little Rock her little sister.

The crew eventually teams up for while before Wichita and her sister split ways to head to their ultimate destination, a childhood amusement park. The plan here is for Little Rock to have her last peaceful fun a child should have before a hard life living in Zombieland, a world ruined by people turned into flesh eating monsters (metaphorically not much different than the world now). Columbus forms a crush on Wichita, which because she is super hot and let’s face it, there aren’t many eligible girlfriends running around.

Their is trouble and gun fights, tension, and a lot of actually charming and funny jokes.

What makes Zombieland unique is it’s not a straight up horror. It’s also an adventure comedy. It’s made like a horror movie. Its chock full of graphic gore living easily up to it’s R rating. Yet it has a playful, satirical feel. It’s a fun movie and highly entertaining.

Shaun of the Dead is the definitive the fan favorite cult zombie comedy. Personally I didn’t like Shaun of the Dead as much as this one. I wanted to like Shaun better, it was more violent and more terrorizing. There is no denying Zombieland has a charm and it gets under your skin. I think Zombieland is more American dark comedy and Shaun of the Dead is more British or Irish type macabre comedy. Booth are worth seeing and I’m sure I’m the minority in liking Zombieland better.

Zombieland tightrope walks its comedy and violence, keeping it just a little bit cartoony and fun without loosing the terror of a zombie take over. I think their trick is almost never killing a human character. If they had humans dying it wouldn’t have felt like fun, it would have been another horror zombie movie. That’s why Zombieland is a comedy about zombie horror and Shaun of the Dead is a zombie horror movie that happens to be funny.

Acting:

Woody Harrelson is great in comedies and he is having fun in this one. Emma Stone is cute and plays the tough girl yet vulnerable role well. Jessie Eisenberg is kind of a dork, but his is smart, has great timing and delivery. I really enjoyed his semi-nerdy role. Though he seems weak, his is tough enough and certainly smart and discipled enough to survive in Zombieland. He sells the character great.

Gore:

A couple smashed heads, blown apart zombies, endless shotguns kills, zombies stabbed, ran over, exploded, on and on, lots of bloody gore. Nothing horribly disgusting but very violent and not for young children.

Sex:

Nothing, just Emma Stone looking sexy.

Directing: 

Triple threat writer, producer, director Robin Fleischer helms this boat. Slick high budget Hollywood studio produced, the movie looked great. Nothing particularly creative, but its wasn’t an artsy, low-budget movie so it was made the traditional way, high quality, no mistakes, no chances taken, nothing gained, nothing lost. The movie never takes itself too serious, the Zombie Rules Columbus comes up with are written on the screen! It’s funny though, and the rules are good zombie survival skills, they keep Columbus alive.

This is Zombieland:

A fun way to spend 90 minutes. It’s not great but it’s very entertaining. If you are looking to watch something a little light hearted with clever banter but still want your horror fix, its well worth watching. I recommend seeing it.

-The Director.

Dead Alive -Aficidados review

Before Peter Jackson directed Lord of the Rings and the Hobbit he made this gem. One of the goriest movies out there. Sometimes campy, funny, but gross as hell. An original gross out Zombie movie, with a karate fighting priest and an 18 minute lawnmower vs. zombies blood bath.
A Must See!

-Aficionados 

Black Sunday reviewed by zee Director

Black Sunday

 

What the hell is going on? 

Asa (Barbara Steele) full-time witch and part-time vampire is put to a violent death by her own fucking brother Prince Vajda! The Prince renounces any ties with his sister, because seriously, nothing divides a family like religion. Asa vows to exact revenge on her family until Vadja shuts her up with a nasty little relic of medieval torture. It is referred to as the Mask of Satan.

The Mask of Satan as seen worn on the red carpet by Ann Hathaway 

The Mask has an Asian samurai looking battlestar galactica face on one side and long ass spikes on the inside. The bastards place that leaden veil on Asa’s face and with a giant hammer, at her brother’s behest, pound that mask into place. That is dressing up for Halloween the hard way.

         My hammer is a tree trunk. 

Sunday getting blacker: 

This film is directed by Mario Bava. He is the great Italian director from the golden age of Italian horror films. Bava’s work inspired the italian ‘gaillo’ film genre which later influenced the modern day slasher films. I obviously recommend his work as it was recommend to me.

Ironically the film is black & white and film has ‘black’ in the title yet there are no black people in the film.

After Asa is masked ‘iron maiden style’ she is buried in a coffin. The coffin has a little glass window at the face. Neat, huh? You don’t see many of those. Coffins with a view. It’s on purpose though. A giant cross is placed in clear view for Asa (through the mask of satan) which renders her powerless. Here, she is left to rot, and rot she dost.

Black Sunday then picks up on the 200th anniversary of Asa and her vampire lover/servant Javutich’s, death by angry mob. The current elderly Prince Vajda knows about the anniversary and is particularly troubled this year. His house servant gives him a phat gold cross and reminds him that crazy dead bitches can’t do shit when you gots a gold ass cross like dat. Well he doesn’t say it like that, being an elderly white man, but it’s basically what he says.

Elsewhere bumbling Doctor Kruejan and handsome young Doctor Gorovek are traveling to Moscow for a medical conference. Dr. Kruejan is a lot like Inspector Gadget but without the gadgets. (I”m not going to type out these long foreign names, so I’ll give them nicknames. Dr. K, and Goro.) Goro has a little too much delicious Russian vodka and Dr. K sends him off to bed. He tells Goro he is going to take a stroll with his pipe and then be up. I assume he isn’t going to take advantage of Goro. It’s not that type of movie. But, it is foreign so you really never know. That’s part of the reason foreign films can be so satisfying.

Without going through all the details, Dr. K ends up in the crypt of Asa the witch. The stooge knocks over the giant cross shattering it, which breaks the window in Asa’s coffin. If that isn’t enough he manages to cut himself and drip his blood on Asa. Here I’m not sure if this begins to restore Asa back to life, because she is a vampire or a witch. She is referred to as a witch yet she behaves like a vampire. It’s a little confusing but, it’s not really as big an issue as I’m making it seem.

Asa calls forth her love and servant Javutich from the grave. Javutich’s wet slimly hand pushes up from the moist earth. I love when you see the dead coming up from the grave. I may be wrong but most modern movies do not have zombies coming up from graves. Though Javutich isn’t a zombie. He is one ugly comrade and there is no way he is plugging Barbara Steele.

(even with his needle dick in her bot fly holes)

Javutich slowly digs himself out of the grave. Great scene. Oh and look another Mask of Satan!

Now the evil witch and her sidekick are back. They quickly posses Dr. K, (doctor of stupidity) and use him to dispatch the prince. It is here I will stop giving plot details.

Ok a few more important details. the Princess is Asa’s mirror image. Actually she is. Barbara Steele plays a dual role as Asa and the Princess. Dr. Goro and a priest become our protagonists, mostly Dr. Goro, who falls for the Princess.

   Dr. Gorovek on the right, me on the left. 

Oh and there is an angry mob. Apparently, before the TV and the internet forming an angry mob was how people entertained themselves at night.

It’s branding time bitch aka a typical weeknight in Russia before TV and the internet. 

Acting: 

I thought Barbara Steele’s performance as the witch stole the show. When she was the princess. She was very somber and pretty in goth but, when she was the witch, you couldn’t take your eyes off her. Well done.
Everyone else was good. I think actors in this era seemed to take their job very seriously. I thought everyone did well. Dr. Goro was a bit of a tool, but it was his character. He reminded me of a prince from a disney movie. Which disney prince? Any of them, except Aladdin, or any non-white 50s era type prince.

Sex:

Mario Bava doesn’t shy away from sex and nudity. This movie should have had some, but nada. So here is an image from one of Bava’s other films (The House of Exorcism) if you are a fourteen year old boy.

Gore:

We get the mask of Satan worn, ouch, some eye gouging, impaling, human bar-b-que, post mask of Satan scares, which look like the worse bot fly marks or the worst black heads ever. (‘Black’ heads in ‘Black’ Sunday!) One very cool eye forming in a skull effect. Mario Bava was know for his special effects and worked on creature FX in some films.

Javutich’s face is disgustingly gory. His bangs and mustache will haunt your dreams.

‘Come with me.’ (Hello! Who wouldn’t?)

Final Black Thought:

Ironically it’s Sunday as I type this in black.

This is a classic foreign horror. It’s creepy and scary like a campfire tale then a walk in the blackest woods. Though today’s movies have amazing practical special FX and CGI, there are classic tales like Black Sunday that still captivate. With me it’s often about two things, was it entertaining? and did it provide me with an escape from reality? This film did both for me. I loved the atmosphere. The details, the costumes, the creepiness of the film, the actors, and the the satanic genre. I don’t watch many black and white movies. I found I quickly accepted the lack of color and wasn’t irritated by it.

I wish there had been some nudity. But I’m just being sleazy. Perhaps the era of sleazy exploitation was not yet upon us. Truth is everything about this movie was cool and spooky, it was little details in films like this that inspired modern day horror masters and their predecessors in the 70s, 80s, and 90s. It is considered the pinnacle of Italian gothic horror. Who am I to question that reputation? Watch it and let it enfold you.

-Director

Hell of the Living Dead review by Lawrence S. Talbot

Hell of the living dead(1980)

Over the years, I’ve seen nearly one-hundred Italian horror films and one theory that I have about them is that the more alternate titles one has, the worse the movie is. Released under the titles Virus, Zombie creeping flesh, and Night of the zombies (and probably a zillion more), Hell of the living dead is a prime example of this rule. The film is directed by infamous knock off and exploitation filmmaker, Bruno Mattei and written by Claudio Fraggasso of Troll 2 fame. With these two schlockmeisters at the helm, Hell of the living dead could be considered so bad that it’s good.

Our journey through cheesiness begins with A team of scientists creating “operation sweet death”, a chemical created to solve the world’s population problem. In typical zombie movie fashion, the agent is released and the world becomes infested with the living dead. Later, swat team finds themselves on a top secret mission in Papua New Guinea where they encounter the titular flesh eaters, along with a group of vacationers. Together, they fight for survival and seek to find the cause of the infection.

I’ll begin with the part that everyone is here for-The gore. Luckily for gorehounds, it’s plentiful. However, those looking for realistic depictions of gory mayhem should look elsewhere as the effects are completely laughable. A charming staple of bad Italian horror films is that the filmmakers always seem to be so focused on their gory set pieces that they forget that the human body isn’t made out of silly putty. The zombies themselves are unimpressive though, mostly consisting of men in glistening, unset greasepaint and the few gory ones look like they’ve had their faces dunked in cherry pie. Another important element of  a good-bad movie is the acting. Here it’s completely madcap and perfectly compliments the zany  and utterly stupid characters, who spout a stream of constant one liners, courtesy of Fraggosso’s signature flair for laugh inducing dialog. Unfortunately, the score is composed of pieces stolen from Goblin’s scores for Dawn of the dead, Contamination, and Beyond the darkness. While these scores are fantastic, it’s really distracting if you’ve seen these movies. What keeps this movie from being the perfect laugh-fest is that it is bogged down by a constant use of stock footage, mostly from nature documentaries and mondo shock films. These scenes go on forever and stop the movie dead in it’s tracks, while not adding anything at all to the narrative. So, unless the idea of watching ten minutes of ancient burial rites and villagers eating maggots seems entertaining to you, I’d recommend keeping the fast forward button handy. Overall, I would recommend this movie as something to watch with a group of friends and a few beers. It’s one of my favorite bad movies.

-Lawrence Talbot         

I walked with a zombie review by Lawrence S. Talbot

I walked with a zombie(1943)

During the second World War, Hollywood became a well-oiled horror machine, producing an ever-expanding heap of horror movies to meet with the growing demands of the public, who sought refuge from the real life horrors of the war. None of these studios was  more successful at creating genuinely frightening and intelligent horror movies as RKO’s B- picture unit, and no other picture was as thoughtful, haunting, and poetic  as 1943’s I Walked with a Zombie.

The story concerns Betsy Connell (Frances Dee), a nurse who travels to the mysterious Caribbean island of Saint Sebastian to care for plantation owner Paul Holland’s (Tom Conway) catatonic wife. Falling in love with Holland, she promises to bring his wife back to him and soon discovers the island’s superstitious Voodoo roots.

Taking its title from a sensational story appearing in American weekly magazine, Producer Val Lewton aimed to elevate the film beyond its lurid source material and instead  drew inspiration from Charlotte Bronte’s Jane Eyre and Daphne Du Maurier’s Rebecca. Together with director Jacques Tourneur and screenwriters Curt Siodmak and Ardell Wray, he fashioned his masterpiece. What makes I Walked with a Zombie so memorable is how rich it is with atmosphere. Cinematographer J. Roy Hunt saturates the film with stylistic dark shadows that could easily compete with the best film noir of the time. The score, by Roy Webb, is filled with lovely melodies and lullabies that are graceful yet minimal; the soundtrack relying  more on the mournful sounds of  the wind, voodoo drums, and  silence, to establish mood rather than a  bombastic horror score. Filmed on sets borrowed from RKO’s  A-pictures and bathed in stunning gloom, it creates a dreamlike and romanticized vision of the West Indies that is completely mesmerizing. The film’s horror comes solely from suggestion and atmosphere, creating a true sense of psychological dread without even a hint of onscreen violence.  Before the sensationalism of today’s gut munching undead, I Walked with a Zombie shows just enough to imply more and asks us to take a chilling look into the dark and into our own hearts.

 -Lawrence S. Talbot                       

Dead Snow review by Zach

          Dead Snow 

 

2009

This Norwegian horror film starts like so many others; a group of college kids on their way to a remote cabin in the mountains for spring break.  You might roll your eyes, and say ‘This old chestnut?’ but when one of the main characters starts naming other horror movies that started the exact same way, you know you’re in for a treat. The friends make it to the remote cabin and immediately start partying, until… a mysterious stranger shows up for some coffee and handy exposition. He weaves a bleak tale about the Nazi’s that occupied that area during the war. Commandant Herzog led a band of 300 men that generally brutalized and stole from everyone in town.

The townsfolk rose up against their oppressors and the ones that weren’t killed by the enraged mob were chased off into the mountains, never to be seen again. The creeper takes his leave after his harbinger of doom shtick is over and the group promptly finds a chest of stolen Nazi gold. This awakens some very angry zombie Nazis that want their misappropriated gold back at any cost. After this the movie really picks up speed with one gory kill after another.

The college students are relatable enough to root for, and the zombies are quick heartless bastards that just won’t stay down. What makes this film stand out and helps it rise above the typical zombie fare is its wicked sense of humor. There are several great laugh out loud moments that you might have to rewind and watch again. The kills are creative and done with old school effects and fountains of blood.

The setting is gorgeous and the camera work never ceases to amaze. Dead Snow won the Audience award at the 2009 Toronto After Dark Film Festival and in my opinion is one of the better zombie movies to come out in recent memory.

-Zach

Tombs of the blind dead review by Lawrence S. Talbot

Tombs of the blind dead 

In 1972, Armando De Ossorio directed the first of four films in his delightfully creepy blind dead series. The resurrected Templet Knights might be the scariest zombies ever created and this film may be one of the most influential horror films of the 1970’s.

In a European castle in the middle of nowhere, the Templars, a fictionalized version of the real Templar Knights, are resurrected when the sun sets. Being horrible sadists in life, the Templars were burned at the stake and their eyes were eaten out by crows, resulting in their blindness. Nightly, they return from the grave as shrouded skeletal figures and feed on the blood of the living. Thought they cannot see, they locate their victims by sound.

An unfortunate woman decides to spend the night in the ruins and is feasted upon by the ghouls. Eventually, her friends venture  to the castle hoping to find her and end up having to fend off the relentless undead Templars.

Though the pacing of the film is a bit slow and it’s very short on plot, Tombs of the blind dead more than delivers when it comes to mood and creepiness. It’s also one of the first european horror films to combine graphic violence with sex, becoming a true exploitation classic. What makes the movie so memorable are the Templars themselves, the magnificent and eerie locations, and the haunting musical score.

The Templars aren’t nearly greasepaint smeared ghouls like most undead in films at the time. They are completely skeletal and shrouded in hoods and rotting medieval garb. Coming in droves, like an army, they slowly shamble along, reaching out their skeletal arms and relentlessly listen for their victims. They are inescapable and unstoppable, and in their reaper-like are hoods are like death itself literally creeping up. One can run for so long, but the undead fiends will eventually get you. To up the ante, the Templars ride on undead horses and carry swords in pursuit of their victims. More than just mindless flesh eaters, they are sadistic in nature and occasionally add sexual torture to the mix. As a result, the Templars are some of the most nightmarish and memorable creatures in the annals of horror. I honestly can’t say enough about them.

The movie was filmed in a crumbling Spanish castle which serve as possibly the most sinister, creepy sets ever put to film, being further augmented by a chilling score composed mostly of chants. The film contains a high level of eerie atmosphere, making Tombs of the blind dead is an unforgettable film experience.

It was followed by three sequels: Return of the evil dead, The ghost Galleon, and Night of the sequels. I would highly recommend the second one as well.

 -Lawrence S. Talbot 

Zombie 2 review by Lawrence S. Talbot

          Zombi 2 

1978 saw the release of the quintessential zombie film, George Romero’s Dawn of the dead. Italian horror maestro Dario Argento served as producer and was given license to create his own cut  of the film in Europe.  It was retitled “Zombi” in Italy and was a massive success. One of the popular trends in Italian filmmaking at the time was churning out often inferior cash-ins or fake sequels to hit films, with the release of “dawn” almost single handedly inspiring the Italian zombie genre and virtually replacing their notorious cannibal movies in the realm of gut munching cinema. An unofficial sequel, Zombi 2 was quickly put into production. Directed by famed director, Lucio Fulci, who had been responsible for some of the great giallo mystery films(Don’t torture a duckling and Lizard in a woman’s skin), directs the film with more integrity than is usually found in these exploitative titles and fashioned what most consider to be his masterpiece. It was released in the United States simply under the title of “Zombie” and became notorious in the U.K as “Zombie flesh eaters”, where it was quickly banned. It is perhaps the greatest of all of the Italian gore epics.

An abandoned ship washes into New York Harbor, where it is investigated by two harbor patrol officers.  Suddenly, a hulking zombie attacks them, ripping the throat out of one officer and being fired upon by the other.

The boat is revealed to belong to the father of  a young woman, Anne Bowles(Tisa Farrow). However, all that she knows about her father had left for the Island of Matool in the Caribbean and that she had not heard from him since. Meanwhile, reporter Peter West(Ian McCulloch) is sent to investigate. The two meet and decide to venture  to Matool to find her father. What follows is a Journey to an island of voodoo superstition and swarms of walking corpses with an appetite for human flesh.

Despite it’s exploitative beginnings, Zombi 2 may be my favorite zombie film. Gianetto De Rossi’s effects far surpass Savini’s work in Dawn of the dead and are genuinely unsettling, especially when you come to the film’s most famous set piece, the infamous “splinter in the eye” sequence. Fulci loads the film with atmosphere, transforming the island of Matool into a dreamlike, nightmare world of fog with a constant tinge of grime that permeates nearly every scene. This makes the film’s gory offerings all the more grotesque, visceral, and dirty. One can almost feel the tropical heat of the island upon viewing the film. The cinematography is downright brilliant and establishes a true sense of dread, despite the characters themselves being virtually paper thin and annoying at times. At times, Fulci’s work recalls the best Spaghetti westerns in style, fully taking advantage of it’s wide screen format, while also being perfectly suited for tighter shots which create a feeling of total claustrophobia. At the end of the day, Zombi 2 is a fine zombie film and one that I would consider essential viewing for anyone who is in love with the genre.

 -Lawrence S. Talbot         

The Living Dead at Manchester Morgue review by Lawrence S. Talbot

The living dead at Manchester morgue.

Review by Lawrence S. Talbot

 

Being released under over 15 different titles internationally, The living dead at Manchester morgue (A.K.A: Let sleeping corpses like, Don’t open the window) is often mistakingly considered to be a British film. Actually, it’s a Spanish/Italian production from Spanish filmmaker, Jorge Grau. However, for better or worse, It and films of it’s kind were responsible for bringing  horror out of the Victorian era and away from the classic gothic set pieces that were formerly popular, thus  changing the face of the genre forever. This film is perhaps the best zombie movie to be released in the genre’s humble beginnings between Night of the living dead and Dawn of the dead.

George (Ray Lovelock), a motorcyclist very much of the “Easy Rider” mold, is on his way to an antique shop when his motorcycle is accidentally damaged by a girl named Edna (Cristina Galbó of “what have they done to Solange?” fame) at a local gas station. After demanding a lift to his destination, the two find themselves at a dead end beside a river. While stopping for directions, they witness a large machine in the field and upon inquiring about it’s use, they discover that the machine is used to destroy insects by blasting sonic radiation waves  into the ground.  Edna is soon attacked by a shambling man by the river and it’s eventually revealed that the radiation has brought the dead back to life. The ghouls unintentionally frame the couple for murder and while dodging attacks from the creatures, they are also on the run from a cop who wants to take them in.

The living Dead at Manchester Morgue may be responsible for setting the Italian zombie genre into motion. It might have been Dawn of the Dead’s influence that would later inspire a rash of imitators, but this earlier effort tends to get overlooked. Filled with gruesome gore and chilling set pieces,  the film begins as a slow build but becomes something of unrelenting shock. It’s visually interesting with it’s depiction of the living dead shambling along the British countryside, through crumbling cemeteries, and eventually laying waste to a hospital. Jorge Grau’s direction is first rate and loaded with atmosphere, further enhanced by lurid colors and the occasional gothic trappings. Living dead at Manchester morgue is a classic Zombie film that is filled with tension and a constant sense of dread. Though the gore might be tame by today’s standards, at the time it was unparalleled by anything else.  However, the atmosphere more than makes up for it and the characters are actually worth caring about.  The Film has since become a cult classic and it’s reputation is well earned as It manages to be both scary and incredibly well made. In the end, this is one of the more imaginative horror films of it’s era and one that shouldn’t be overlooked.

-Lawrence S. Talbot