FILM FEST: The Unwatchables - Netflix Edition Vol. III

I figured the best way to bring the guys back into the fold here was with a good old-fashioned Netflix Film Fest EXTRAVAGANZA.  Plus with Netflix I don’t feel bad if they don’t watch the whole thing because I’m not out the price of a shitty physical disc.  Also, in general it’s just easier to document if they bail early in the film.  So.  Buckle your seatbelts, it’s gonna be a long night.

[Zoombies (2005)]

Not going to lie, when they saw the production company was The Asylum, they almost made me stop this piece of garbage before it started.

[...]

Lovelock: Take Jurassic Park, add a helping of We Bought a Zoo, and just a pinch of Noah’s Ark.  Now subtract Matt Damon and remove everything good about the stories I mentioned and… BOOM – you got yourself Zoombies, kind of.

Starkwell: We’ve watched one minute of the movie.

Lovelock: Yeah but I mean, for fuck’s sake look at the font they’re using for the credits.

Starkwell: Right?

[...]

Hard to argue with that?  Soon after that a bad CGI monkey died and reanimated and included MONKEY POV.  Lovelock and STarkwell both started laughing and eventually got real quiet and said “yeah no, please stop the movie” and “NEXT” and “HARD PASS”.  We almost made it past the cold open.

[Condemned (2015)]

I think that we’re all okay with the concept behind this one, but it starts with this “CREEPY” old narrator.  Also known as bad start.  Starkwell says something about the fourth wall or like “can’t a movie just fucking be a movie.”  Then they got into a weird conversation about whether or not it should be “fucking be a movie” or “be a fucking movie”.  Meanwhile the movie continued.

[Entitled Princess goes with her “Bad Part of Town Punk Friends” to their apartment where they are squatting in a condemned building.]

Lovelock: first, she has it coming.  Second, I’m already totally fine if she dies, third, let’s move along to that part.

Starkwell: Harsh.

[We then meet the KERRAZY tenants at the condemned building.  It’s boring.]

Lovelock: This is boring.

Starkwell: Who would even save these boring people?  NOT WORTH IT.

Lovelock: Torch the building, and the people and this movie NOW.

[...]

So yeah, takes forever to get going and in the end it’s more like the Crazies of the Crazies was a super boring and shitty movie.

[Zombeavers (2014)]

At a runtime of 75-ish minutes, they should be able to get through this one… maybe?

[...]

Lovelock: Is that Bill Burr and John Mayer?

[...]

After a legitimately funny opening with these two known people, it could only go down from there, obviously.  And it does.  BOY DOES IT EVER.  The actual movie, follows three girls on a vacation at some lakehouse, because EVERYONE HAS A LAKEHOUSE!  It’s mostly bad beaver puns and innuendos and excuses to get the actresses to take their tops of.

[Beaver attack in the lake.]

Lovelock:  Bad effects, but still, charming beaver puppets.  Glad they didn’t go CGI.

Starkwell: I guess.

[...]

The short runtime saves it from being a full on zero, along with the fantastic beaver muppets, but honestly, I could have done without the human turns beaver stuff.  Somehow worked with that sheep movie but not with this one so much.  And why make a guy get his dick eaten?

[Splatter (2009)]

I think it’s safe to say that we are all here for Corey Feldman.

[...]

Starkwell: This thing is 30 minutes too long.

Lovelock:  It’s only 30 minutes long?

Starkwell: BINGO.

Lovelock: IT’S SO SIMPLE.

Starkwell: Nailed it.

[...]

That’s a Corey Feldman album reference, if anyone cares.  What a dull hunk of shit.  I think that was enough punishment for now.  Until next time.

The Horrible Dr. Bones.

“The Horrible Dr. Bones” is another Full Moon pictures production.  The director was one of the directors involved in “The Dungeonmaster” which pretty much means that we can expect nothing short of pure cheese.  Cheese can satisfy sometimes, but it also can lead to experiences like “Shrunken Heads” or anything Charles Band is involved with.  We won’t know how this one will play out until we attack it head on.  So, let’s do this.  It has a wonderfully short seventy minute run time, so, at least that will help.

[...]

[THE DVD I ORDERED DOESN’T WORK.]

Starkwell: Probably for the best.

Lovelock: Thank you, Universe.

[...]

Zero thumbs up.  Too bad the ‘I don’t remember where I bought this’ store has a no return policy.

Forest Of The Dead.

So the film is a cheap Canadian horror film.  The DVD, once you hit “play movie” it opens up with the cheapest looking, shot on VHS (EVEN THOUGH IT’S 2007), footage of the director, Brian Singleton, talking about the movie in an unbuttoned Hawaiian shirt, chest flowing in the breeze, while “drinking” from what looks to be a “brown-bagged” bottle of… champagne?  Apple cider?  I think we might need something stronger to get through this.

[...]

[After the opening credits, shots of car driving, worst “pop punk” music ever plays.]

Starkwell: Why is always a bad “pop punk” song?

Lovelock: Probably because it’s always like “director’s brother’s shitty band”.

Starkwell: Good call.

[...]

The movie is CLEALY just a movie made by a bunch of dudes for fun while on summer vacation.  It’s bad, but I could see maybe it would be fun to watch if you know the people in the movie.   To be totally fair, for what is clearly a no-budget movie shot by a bunch of friends, it’s alright I guess.  Bad writing, bad jokes, and no acting at all… but somehow Lovelock and Starkwell haven’t set fire to the TV yet… granted, it’s early.  The guys talking in the fake Quebec accents are REALLY bad.  Really fucking bad.  I would expect more from actual Canadians.  They're probably from Toronto.

[...]

[Blonde girl is wearing an Expos shirt.]

Starkwell: Let’s go Expos!

Lovelock: I’m pretty sure the redneck mechanic was quoting “Fletch” just now…

[...]

The premise is pretty straightforward.  A group of teens go camping at an old campsite that is closed down and rumored to be haunted, and bad shit happens.  The problem is, it is taking a really long time to get going.  Also the novelty of this being backyard horror made by a bunch of dumb kids from Ontario is wearing off, and now everyone is getting crazy bored.

[...]

Lovelock: At least they haven’t played any more of that shitty “my friend’s band” music.

[...]

Then randomly the girl walks in on her boyfriend, one of the Quebec dudes, and he’s in his sleeping bag naked with the other Quebec dude?  Because, people from Quebec are gay?  At this point the movie lost Starkwell.  He got up, said something about being too old for this shit, and ran out of the room, top speed.  Just then, the movie shifted, and people finally started dying.

[...]

Lovelock: Why would kids from Quebec be drinking moonshine?

[...]

Then the group’s friends show up.  Basically a second group of shitty non-actors.  It’s like the movie has started over.  This second group is as obnoxious as the first.  Equally unfunny.  I think the best shot in the movie so far was one where the “afro” guy was “taking a leak”… but when he turned his head, you could see that he was just squeezing a Gatorade bottle.  Makes me think that they couldn’t afford a second bottle of Gatorade, so they were like “I think we got it”.

[...]

Lovelock: The nerd guy’s vest is different in every scene.

[...]

Lovelock:  These woods look like the same ones that Fred Penner shot his show in.

[...]

Seriously, what ever happened to that guy?  Also, what ever happened to Raffi?

[...]

Lovelock: If it’s an abandoned campground why would there be an old basketball court… in an abandoned parking lot… next to a highway?  Wait they have a rock climbing wall?

[...]

Fred Penner had an album in 2008?  Crazy.  And Raffi has been upto some seriously rad shit.  Amazing.  Also he had a new album this year?  Oh also, the movie still sucks.  Nothing has happened for the last half hour.

[...]

[Zombies rip nerd guy in half and eat his intestines.]

Lovelock: I mean, it looked awful, but ‘A’ for effort.

[In the next shot, his vest is different again.]

[...]

Lovelock: If you are alone, being chased by zombies, and you wander into and old farmhouse, and you stumble upon a piano… WHY WOULD YOU HIT ONE OF THE KEYS?

[...]

In the end everyone dies.  And then there are ten minutes of ending credits and bloopers.  The guys who made this obviously love movies and each other, even if they themselves are terrible at writing and maybe even editing, and none of them can act.  And their friend’s band sucks.  They’re not half bad at gore though.  The effects are obviously cheap, but a lot of fun and pretty bloody.  They shouldn’t have wasted so much time setting up story.  If it just been full of a lot more of the gags that were all over the last twenty minutes, this might have actual been enjoyable.

BURT MALONE LETTERS: Zombies All Over the Small Screen.

He’s already once expressed his love for the wildly popular “The Walking Dead”, while simultaneously hating on how popular zombies have become.  It was only a matter of time before he started checking out some of the other shows that have popped up in the wake of the AMC show's success.

[...]

Well hello again, good sir.

I’ve been kind of going crazy with the binge watching of late, and I stumbled upon a couple of real gems. And some turds, obviously.

I started up with the somewhat slowly paced “The Returned”, a French show based on the film “They Came Back”, or “Les Revenants”.

The show starts slow, and keeps that pace mostly throughout the eight episodes that I watched.  Much like the film, it has a very serious tone, is totally weird and confusing, and at the same time, kind of scares the BAJEBUS out of me.

Unlike the film, the show starts off focused on a bus load of children that flew off a cliff suddenly coming back a year later as if nothing happened.

AND THE PARENTS FLIP THE FUCK OUT.

It’s eerie, it’s cool, and Mogwai did the soundtrack.  And Mogwai kicks fucking ass and helps create mega tension.

Like in the film, the undead essentially try to resume their lives, unaware, seemingly, that they died.  But there’s all sorts of mysterious shit going on and we are trying to figure out what the deal is.  Super cool.  I can’t wait to see the second season.  Good, and complicated, characters.  Great dialogue and acting.  More television needs to be like this.

Which brings me to the somewhat unnecessary American version of “Les Revenants” called “Resurrection”.  I can’t say it’s bad, actually.  At least it’s SORT OF doing its own thing.  It’s not like when “Quarantine” came out as a nearly identical, but just in English, version of “REC”.  I haven’t seen enough of it to really pass any judgment.  It got picked up for a second season, which doesn’t NECESSARILY mean anything, but it does mean they got to develop the story further.  Which is always a good thing.  Not sure if the third season is coming or not.

Next up, in an attempt to liven things up, I went for the tragically short-lived MTV show “Death Valley”.

I can see why this show didn’t make it on a network aimed at people who watch shows about teen moms, people falling on their testicles, and other such dumb shit.  Most MTV shows that aren’t reality TV are on par, creatively speaking, with most Disney Channel shows.

“Death Valley” was gory, ACTUALLY FUNNY, and in a way, fairly original.  Which makes it a strange offering for MTV.  Shot mockumentary style, and following a police department in charge of taking care of werewolves, zombies and vampires, I found myself digging the characters immediately.   Well-paced, well written, and a lot of fun… obviously, it was cancelled after one season.  Had the show been on a network like FX, or even something like Showtime, AMC or HBO, the series’ fate might have been radically different.

Which brings me to the VIOLENTLY unfunny, unoriginal and unnecessary ScyFy Channel original, “Z Nation”.  It’s a production from “The Asylum”, so honestly, I don’t even need to watch a single episode to know that it is a complete piece of shit - a lame mockbuster cash grab attempt to ride the zombie wave.  But, I felt I should watch at least one episode.  All of my suspicions were more than correct.  In short, the show should be called “ZZZZZzzzzzz Nation”.  Because it’s boring.  So boring.

And yet, I could totally see it going on for a couple of years.  Because somehow shit like this gets watched.  Somewhere out there are idiots thinking "man, can't wait for the new season of Z Nation".  And then they take a selfie and talk about how good "The Big Bang Theory" is.  Brutal.

Next up on my marathon of binge watching was a BBC show called “In the Flesh”.

HOLY SHIT.  The zombie apocalypse is over, and the government are rehabilitating the “used to be” zombies of the world.  The doctors call the formerly dead “partially deceased syndrome sufferer”.  It’s not that no one has tackled the idea of “what if the zombies stopped being zombies” or “what if there WAS a cure”, but in a way, kind of nobody has.  At least not with the serious tone of this show.  Within five minutes I can tell that I am not going to want to stop watching this one.

Way recommeneded.  I’m glad I watched this after “Z Nation” because, quite honestly, I thought nothing would ever clean my brain of that depressingly bad show.

After all of this, and ending on a zombie show high note, I decided to take it up another notch and settle nicely into binge watching a ‘not actually a zombie show, but it has zombies in it, technically’, known as “Game Of Thrones”, anxiously looking forward to any scene with the ‘White Walkers’, who are, basically, MEDIEVAL ZOMBIES FUCK YEAH.

And there are dragons.

Also, all of the wonderful female nudity is pretty nice.

[...]

He can complain all he wants about the zombie’s surge in popularity, but from the sound of it, even he agrees that it has lead to some rather good television… definitely more interesting than all the vampire crap out there in the wake of “Twilight”.  Except "Z Nation" which sounds worse than it sounds.  Anyways, here’s hoping that it takes at least a couple more years before we get a zombie sitcom starring Zooey Deschanel or some shit.

WHO’S THAT ZOMBIEeeeeEeeeeeee…

Ugh.

Diary Of The Dead.

People like to crap all over the second Romero dead trilogy, but I honestly thought “Land of the Dead” was good.  There’s something comforting about a zombie film made by Romero.  It’s like listening to an old favorite band that is sort of phoning it in, but I mean, come on, they’re still fun.  Unfortunately, this usually is the beginning of the end for a band/director, and eventually they start sounding/looking like the people originally imitating them.  Like when Weezer starts sounding like a Weezer cover band.  Or when Romero makes “Diary of the Dead”, basically.  But at least at that point they haven’t totally gone off the fucking deep end, hit rock bottom, and made “Survival of the Dead”.  I'll save that complete fucking turd for another day… of the dead.

[...]

[Intro, FOUND FOOTAGE style.]

Starkwell: Proof that even the greats succumb to shitty fads.

Lovelock: So Romero saw "REC" and was like, hey didn’t I kind of make that?  No?  Okay, maybe I should?

[The acting looks like, well, it won’t be very good.]

Starkwell: “Land” had a decent cast, I guess this one… doesn’t?

[...]

Now we get the intro of the “FILM WITHIN A FILM” called “The Death of a Dream”…  Basically people were making horror film, and eventually zombies rolled in, and so they kept rolling.  AND THEN some annoying girl took all of this footage and edited together this “Death of a Dream” movie… about the outbreak.  So I guess the zombie outbreak ended and she had time to edit this, narrate it, add music and… show it to all of us?  I don’t get it.

[...]

[FIRST PERSON VIEW going through dark and scary empty dorms.]

Starkwell: Definitely has a video game kind of feel.

Lovelock: Complete with “First Resident Evil's live action scenes” level of acting and dialogue.

Starkwell: So who's the master of unlocking?

[Groan.]

[...]

Then the main girl Deb says she wants to go home to Scranton, Pennsylvania.  Then, rather than listening to the shit dialogue, Starkwell and Lovelock started talking about “The Office”.   The ‘gang’ are driving in some sort of RV.  They see their first zombies and run them over, pretty nonchalantly.  Then, after, they all freak out?

[...]

[They pull over, and the girl that was driving blows her own brains out.]

Starkwell: That seemed a bit… sudden.  Kind of an overreaction...

Lovelock: I don’t think ANYONE would react that severely, even if they were real people.

[They go to a hospital, because she still has a pulse.]

Lovelock: She can't drive, OR blow her own brains out?

Starkwell: So what they were driving along the highway and they just happened to be right next to a hospital, right as the driver shot herself in the face?

Lovelock: SWISS CHEESE PLOT.

[...]

Starkwell and Lovelock are really having problems with this one.  On the bright side, the zombies look great (one thing Romero always gets right), and there are some decent scares her in the hospital.  There are some CG effects in the mix and they aren’t great, though.

[...]

Starkwell: HOLY BALLS THE DIALOG IS BAD.

[...]

Romero is clearly trying to make a point that in this age of information, too many people are filming, there are eyes everywhere, no one is living, people want to see life filtered through a camera, through TV, and through BLABLABLA… to be honest he is FULLY beating his point to DEATH, unnecessarily so, and on top of that, it feels like he is trying to say more than one thing (?).  He could have focused more on action and building characters and been more subtle about his point(s).  We are the walking dead, yeah I get it.

[...]

[They meet a deaf Amish farmer and use his barn to fix their RV.]

Lovelock: Good thing the Dumb Blonde knows how to fix the… fuel line?

Starkwell: This is some gang they’ve put together.

[Zombies close in on them.]

Lovelock: He’s not doing a very good job at building tension.  I honestly don’t feel worried at all.

Starkwell: To be fair, that’s mostly because you don’t give a shit about the characters.

[...]

Then the Amish guy dies almost immediately, making him as pointless as all of the rest of the characters in this movie.  Then they meet some black dudes… ‘gangstas’ I guess.  THEN THEY SHOW MAIN CHARACTER JASON and THE NERD GUY EDITING THE MOVIE.  Scenes we’ve already seen.  The movie within the movie within the movie within the movie?  I don’t know how many levels down we’re diving.  But I’m pretty sure we’re swimming in the deep end.  Of a pool of shit.

[...]

[Zombie takes a bottle of hydrochloric acid to the head and it slowly melts.]

Lovelock: Probably sounded better on paper.  Because fucknuts that looked bad.

[...]

Really just feels like a movie written by an old out of touch guy.  I guess it was.  And by the way, the old professor in the gang has a fucking bow and arrow now.  The gang now goes to their rich friend’s house, but he’s gone crazy after killing his whole family after they done gone zombie.  It’s a super long and dragged out scene that doesn’t really go anywhere until he goes zombie too.

[...]

[Main character films zombie running after Blondie, and, doesn’t help her.]

Starkwell: This movie is dumb.

Lovelock: At least we got to see dem boobies.

[...]

Anyways, the main character dies and the movie ends, after some more cheesy dialog asking whether we, as a species, are worth saving. Ugh.  I'm surprised that Lovelock didn't say "diarrhea the dead' at some point... Seems like a missed opportunity.

BURT MALONE LETTERS: Kids' Shows with Zombies in Them.

Burt just sent me an email out of the blue, complaining about Kids' Shows with zombies in them.  This might have to do with  the fact that I recently heard Burt Malone is gonna be a father soon.  I think he’s frustratingly trying to find something he could watch with his kid other than the standard fare.

[...]

HOLY SHIT Kev, where to start?

First, I tried watching one episode of “My Babysitter’s a Vampire” and it made me throw up all over my own face.  The first episode starts and it’s as if I’m supposed to already know who these two fucking knobs are.  Saying shit like “newbs” and “spellcaster” and “vampire killing”.

Like all shows about teenagers, the plot revolves around a guy doing what he's gotta do to try to get into girls' pants.  He may not know that’s what he’s doing, but that’s what he’s doing.  In this case that means bringing her dog back to life.  And then one character was like “Harry Potter would be ashamed” and then I’m pretty sure there was a foghorn sound, and then this theme song starts that sounds like a terrible Sugar Ray B-Side, and I stopped watching.

I did however skip forward to the actual “zombie” episode, and it was even worse than I thought it would be.  Truth be told, I probably would have liked this show if it were on when I was a kid.  That’s not saying much though, because I used to look forward to watching TGIF.

Step by step.  Day by day.  Moving right along.  

I decided to give R.L. Stine’s “The Haunting Hour” a shot, and I must say, this one was much more delightful.  It helped that the zombie episode I watched had the kid from “Modern Family” in it.  Eventually the kid reanimates a corpse (?), and honestly, the makeup job is sweet, and it’s fairly scary.  If my TGIF watching self had seen this, I’d probably have shit my pants.

The story plays out like something in between “Re-Animator”, “Frankenstein” and, well, “Lassie”?  One lame thing though, “The Haunting Hour” is only a thirty minute show, which I think might be confusing for children.

Cheeky the zombie likes the Home Shopping Network!  And in the end we even get to meet his zombie mom!  It’s all fairly cool.

This R.L. Stine show got me thinking about that “Goosebumps” show from twenty years ago.  There was a two part ‘living dead’ type episode where all the townspeople are poisoned by some kind of chemical disaster.  Part one is slow moving and boring.  It picks up a little bit in part two but I can’t help but feel that most kids, if they aren’t too afraid to watch this kind of show, will not have the required attention span to sit through it.  Nice to see the Canadian landscapes though.  Like in the newer R.L. Stine show, the zombies look pretty sweet, although the “SPECIAL EFFECTS” when the zombies steam/dissolve/die in the sunlight are PISS POOR.

Apparently there’s a movie coming out called “Goosebumps” where Jack Black plays R.L. Stine.  So that’s something to… look forward to?

After “Goosebumps” I tried watching “Frankenweenie” but fell asleep eating a sandwich.  I mean the plot is like a combination of that FUCKING “Vampire Babysitter” episode I watched and the more enjoyable “Haunting Hour” (this may not be accurate though, I feel asleep very quickly).  Why is it that in kid-friendly horror stuff they always bring dogs back to life?

I would like to say, however, that what I saw of “Frankenweenie”, was actually quite good, and the animation kicked fucking ass.  I don’t blame the movie for my falling asleep, I blame the genoa salami.  Also I ended up having nightmares.  Again, not from the movie, probably from the genoa.  Stupid nightmare sandwich.

If I follow YOUR scoring style, I'd have to give the babysitter show a 1/4, "Haunting Hour" and "Frankenweenie" a 3/4 and the old "Goosebumps" a 2/4.  But since I don't follow YOUR scoring style, I will give the babysitter show a "FUCK YOU", the haunting hour gets a solid "MEH", "Goosebumps" gets the honorary award for "90's haircuts and mom jeans" and "Frankenweenie" gets a Tim Burton.

IN CONCLUSION.  I think I’m better off waiting until the kid is older, and just introduce him to real zombie movies right off the bat.  How old is old enough to watch Fulci movies?  Six?  Definitely by seven, right?  In the meantime, I’ll just show him Looney Tunes cartoons.

That’s it, I’m actually gonna go watch some cartoons now.

[...]

He should have also watched “Paranorman”, which was actually pretty awesome too.  Good luck with the baby Burt Malone.  Try and squeeze in some time to write me, from time to time.

Dead Creatures.

This is one of those zombie movies from the turn of the century that went entirely unnoticed, since, at that time, no one (present company excluded) gave a shit about zombie movies.  Especially not ones that were trying to do something a little different.  That being said, that it went unnoticed doesn’t necessarily make it bad.  So this might be an undiscovered gem.  Or it could be undiscovered for a reason.  We’ll know soon enough.

[...]

[British guy, acting like a cop takes a teenage punk hostage and seems to be getting ready to torture him.]

Starkwell: If he is a cop, his methods are quite unorthodox.

[Cut to a group of women getting stoned and talking about sex and wieners.]

Lovelock: Thems are some seriously British teeth.

Starkwell: And some pretty serious mom jeans... which seems like even in the early two thousands should have already been out of date.

[Then it cuts to one of the girls feeding some horrible looking bleeding face girl some kind of miscellaneous meat.]

Starkwell: WHAT in the FUCK.

Lovelock: Is any of this gonna be explained?

[Cut to one of the girls ripping off some meat from… HUMAN LIMBS.  Like hands and legs.]

Lovelock: I repeat.  EXPLANATION?

[So these ladies are all eating human.]

[...]

Then one of the girls mentions that it is starting to smell so she takes a sack filled with what’s left of the dude they were eating and throws it into someone’s backyard.  Lovelock and Starkwell are confused and feeling seriously unsettled.  Apparently the punk locked up in the cop’s basement has been there a whole week?  Insane.  There is no real explanation for what is going on, really.   Then there’s a guy who kills a girl and eats her, so I guess the cannibalism thing isn’t solely happening to the ladies.  I’m lost.  Starkwell and Lovelock are lost.  I think maybe the writer director was as well.

[...]

[One of the girls gives a guy a blowjob for twenty bucks, and then kills him and takes him back to eat him and share with the gang.]

Starkwell: Wait, why did she bother to give him the blowjob if she was just gonna kill him and eat him?

Lovelock: And a condomless one at that.

[I don't think these ladies are worried about catching anything, since they appear to be, zombies.]

[...]

Then there’s a scene where the guy that was eating people takes his shirt off and he has a huge cut on his stomach like he had been gutted.  He then duct taped it shut.  So… now it's much more clear... these people are all zombies.  Still so confused, though.

[...]

[Two girls saw (like saw as in CUT) a random dude into pieces and cry a whole bunch and then pray (as in to God).]

Starkwell: This is certainly very different than the norm.

Lovelock: Are there any heroes in this movie?  The whole thing seems centered around a bunch of decomposing cannibals.  Are we supposed to feel bad for these bitches?  I don't.

[...]

The gore is pretty great and very, as I've said, unsettling.  It cuts from a girl having tea and biscuits with her grandma to the cop guy sawing a guy’s head off, or girls picking guts out of a carcass.  The only complaint the guys have at this point is that not a whole lot is actually HAPPENING other than people eating people and turning all gross and decomposey.

[...]

[The virus clearly spreads by bite and/or scratch.]

Starkwell: They are EASILY the least rabid zombies ever.

Lovelock: Like slacker zombies or something.  “Come here, let me hit you on the head with a hammer gently, thanks darling, oh look you’re dead.”

Starkwell: Even the people that die don’t make a sound when they get killed.  “I’m dead.  Bummer dude.”

Lovelock: Also… EVERYONE in this movie mumbles.

[...]

All of a sudden, Lovelock and Starkwell realized that the cop guy was a zombie hunter.  Hence sawing off a dude’s head, or driving a rod through their brain, or asking the punk about eating people.

[...]

Starkwell: Oldest, most crotchety, zombie hunter ever.

Lovelock: Seriously, zombie hunting is supposed to be a young man’s game.

[It’s become clear now, also, that he isn’t a cop, but a guy looking for his daughter (?), killing zombies along the way.]

[...]

So, I GUESS the zombie hunter guy is the hero.  Anyways, the guys are getting a little bored, as it is quite slow moving, but they both agree that in a way this was a bit ahead of its time.  The writer/director’s previous film was essentially a mockumentary about one guy’s slow descent into zombieness after being bitten… so he clearly likes to try to present the subject in a more ‘real’ and different way than expected or previously done.  Kinda neat… but we all agree the pace sucks.

[...]

[Turns out the zombie hunter’s daughter was the decomposing zombie girl from the beginning.  He finds out when he tortures one of the main characters.]

Lovelock: Wow.  It all comes full circle and yet, BORES THE SHIT OUT OF ME AT THE SAME TIME UGH SO BORING.

Starkwell: Snoozefest.

[After zombie hunter gets his daughter’s history, he kills the girl.]

Lovelock: Well, at least he’s thorough.

[He throws his tools into a lake.]

Lovelock: Wait?  What? No? If you don’t keep killing them who will?  Ugh, this movie.

[...]

Then the new girl shows up at the hooker’s place and they eat a dude.  The end, immediately.  So… um… yeah.  Great on paper, but quite boringly executed.

Fistful of Brains.

It’s hard to imagine that this is one of THREE zombie films that this writer director has managed to put out.  Granted with the micro-budget that these are likely made on, I can’t imagine any one of them being particularly grand or wonderful.  I don’t know how long the dudes will hang on this time around.  The intro credits play over, what I assume are scenes taken directly from the movie, while THE WORST FUCKING WESTERN SONG EVER RECORDED plays.  It’s kind of like how at the beginning of a porno they show a small clip from each scene and flash the actors’ names.  Like Anita Hardcock or something.

[...]

[Intro credits go on seemingly forever. With the theme song dragging on endlessly.]

Starkwell: I mean, you’re fucking joking right?

Lovelock: Shot on a Nikon Coolpix camera.  From ten years ago.  Edited by a free program that came with Windows Millenium Edition.

Starkwell: I’m waiting for the starwipe.

[...]

[Characters are introduced in a western ‘town’.]

Lovelock: I think I said this last time we watched one like this, but I think this was filmed at the Great Escape in Lake George.

Starkwell: Judging by the buildings, they’re not trying very hard to look authentic.

Lovelock: Those are some fancy light fixtures for the WILD WEST.

[...]

So there’s a snake oil salesman who sells the townspeople stuff.  And the ‘saloon’ is some dive bar with stuff written in permanent marker all over the ceiling and the bar, stuff like “James and Mindy 4 evah”, which all looks and sounds very authentically western, of course.

[...]

[A bunch of zombies eat some cowboys in the woods.  The one survivor tells the sheriff and FLIPS OUT!]

Starkwell: I know this is terrible, but it’s reaching some seriously insanely, near funny, bad heights right now.

Lovelock: Seriously, I’m nearly entertained by just how much of a trainwreck this actually is.

Starkwell: That guy’s a good actor.

[...]

There isn’t much point in documenting this any further.  There were a lot of laughs.  A lot. I doubt this was meant to be a comedy.  Given how painfully bad this was, I can’t help but want to track down the sequel “Few Brains More”… Of course, Starkwell and Lovelock would need some time before they'd agree to watch it.  Don’t believe the IMDB user review claiming this is like 'Sam Raimi’s “Evil Dead” set in the 1800s'.  I mean I suppose it’s true if you change ‘Sam Raimi’ to ‘High School Drama Club', ‘Evil Dead’ to ‘total piece of shit’ and ‘set in the 1800s’ to ‘filmed in a small town using the local townies as the cast’.  I will say though, the film ends with a girl being thrown off a cliff and has a pretty sweet dummy shot.  A good dummy shot tends to make everything ok, and Starkwell and Lovelock ended up leaving feeling pretty good.

[...]

Lovelock: In a word, TRAINWRECK I CAN’T LOOK AWAY.

Starkwell: That’s more than one word.

Lovelock: This movie could never be described in one word.

Starkwell: Sure it can.  Terrible.

Lovelock: Fair enough.

[...]

This movie is bad in the way that old eighties or seventies movies were bad, which is kind of refreshing.  It looks like a lot of care was put into making it, a lot of time, a lot of effort.  It's kind of fun to see that, even when it is - especially when it is - a colossal failure.  When movies TRY to be 'so bad it's good', it never works.

The Roost.

I don’t know a whole heck of a lot about this movie other than that it is now a few years old and that the director has recently been involved in some of those anthology horror films.  None of what I just said leads me to believe it will be very good, but I’ve been wrong before.

[...]

[DVD Menu and intro has that grainy “faux” grindhouse look…]

Starkwell: So it’s to be one of those?

Lovelock: This was made for the Showtime network?

Starkwell: If it was ScyFy I’d be running for the hills.

[...]

Anyways, the intro is set up as if we are watching some old black and white horror television program.  The director does a decent job making fun of old fashioned black and white cheeseball TV horror.  Unfortunately it takes too long to get going.  Like, yeah, we get it, old horror.

[...]

[The “frightmare” tv show thingy goes on, as he introduces the story of people on a way to a wedding.]

Lovelock: The intro to Disney’s Tower of Terror is more gripping than this.

Starkwell: The movie is only eighty minutes, and he had to pad the beginning with this?

Lovelock:  Plus these credits are taking a good five minutes.

[This is the second round of intro/credits if you count the ones before the fake TV show thing.]

Starkwell: Long, unnecessary… even a bit confusing.

[...]

Around the seven or eight minute mark, now the movie starts.  It’s Halloween (?) and some college kids are on their way to a wedding?  Then a bat or something flies into their car.

[...]

[Old farmer guy goes to lock up his barn and is turned into a zombie by… bats?]

Lovelock: Wait what?

[His wife goes to find him and it cuts away before we see anything, so maybe he isn’t a zombie.  I don’t know.]

Starkwell: Is the movie just going to keep NOT SHOWING us something and then cutting away?

[...]

The film is really poorly lit.  There are a lot of dark shots of the actors holding flashlights and honestly, you can’t see anything.  So the college kids are stranded, and thankfully they are near the farmhouse, which hopefully means someone will get eaten soon.  Thirty minutes in and not much has happened except some college kids getting their car stuck in a ditch.

[...]

[Finally the “goofy” college kid goes to check out the barn.  Dies?  There’s a cop that goes in next, and he… also dies?  Actually we actually SEE the cop die, unlike everything else so far.]

Lovelock: Wait, he didn’t die by bats, he fell out a window?  That’s lame.

Starkwell: Is the cop Trent Reznor?

Lovelock: What?  No.  You’re an idiot.

Starkwell: I’m just trying to find something, anything, to be even just a touch excited about.

Lovelock: Maybe he jumped out the window to hurt himself, today.

Starkwell: Please don't.

Lovelock: To see if he still feels.

[...]

All of this is followed by a whole bunch more of the college kids being all “what should we do?  I don’t know.  What should we do?  Let’s talk about it forever”.  Honestly, JUST DO SOMETHING.  Also, why did they bother make it Halloween, and mention it explicitly... it's fully irrelevant.

[...]

[Finally, zombie cop pops out with a melty face and a rabid demeanor.]

Lovelock: There we go.  More of that, movie, and less of EVERYTHING ELSE YOU’VE DONE SO FAR.

[The college kids beat him to death with a shovel.]

Starkwell: They had him locked up in a barn… why would they just kill him when they don’t even know what’s wrong with him?  Crazy.

[That happens a lot in these movies.  I like to think in real life people wouldn’t go right from “Bill, is that you?” to “SHOVEL YOUR FACE TO A PULP”.]

[...]

Anyways, more running from bats, and hunkering down in a farmhouse, and then running from bats again, and eventually more zombies… but it’s all fairly slow moving.

[...]

[Guy with glasses shoots old lady zombie in the face.]

Lovelock: Wait, he had never even seen her before, and all she was doing was shuffling around in a room…  There was NOTHING about her that suggested zombie, or monster, or SHOOT ME.

[Zombie farmer pops out and bites glasses guy.]

Starkwell: Well that’s more clearly a zombie.

Lovelock: Maybe not.  I mean the dude just shot his wife in the face, maybe he’s just getting revenge.  In conclusion, this is some bullshit right here.

Starkwell: OLD LADY! KILL IT!  That's just bananas.

[...]

Then, as if to say “just when you thought this shit was ending soon” it cuts back to the fake tv show, and the “host” says some dumb shit and then it goes back to the movie.  WHY?!?!?!?!

[...]

[Everyone dies.]

Lovelock: Good.

[...]

The end.  But not before another shitty black and white tv show segment, which, for some reason, this time is in widescreen as opposed to being in full screen as it was earlier.  If you're gonna be lame, at least keep the lame consistent.  GIMMICKS EVERYWHERE! Hate.

The Horde.

The later part of last decade was when the whole zombie film thing was really hitting the saturation point.  After the success of “Zombieland” it seemed like everyone was putting out some kind of zombie movie.  It’s only gotten worse now in the wake of the hit TV show based around the ol’ zombie apocalypse.  Anyways, back in 2009, the French got in on the action with a rather cookie cutter action packed zombie bonanza extravaganza, about cops and robbers and, of course, zombies.  At best it will play out like if Luc Besson made a zombie movie, and at worst, it will be exactly what we expect it to be.

[...]

[People at a funeral, ALL INTENSE.  Some dude plans on going after the dudes that killed his… miscellaneous relative /  friend (?)… so they go and attack a whole apartment building.]

Lovelock: Wait, the bad guy gangsters have a whole building?

Starkwell: I guess they’re squatting in an abandoned building.

Lovelock: France looks like it totally sucks.  And not for the usual reasons.

[...]

So the rag-tag gang charge the group of drug dealers to get their friend back, and two of them are shot immediately.  Wait, I just realized that the rag-tag gang are actually cops.  I guess they were going vigilante style in order to kill the dudes that killed their friend, and and also rescue the hostage.  Too late, the drug lords just shot the hostage and now the “gang” are all hostages.  And the drug lords just killed another one of them.

[...]

Starkwell: Worst vigilante cops ever.

Lovelock: They should have watched “Death Wish 3” beforehand to see how this shit is done.

[...]

The action so far has been pretty good, but it moments later EXPLODES into a frenzy of zombie action when the recently deaded hostages start eating gangsters, and zombies start charging the building.  The zombies are definitely more rabid than slow and lumbering, and take a bit from “Demons” to be completely honest.

[...]

[Weak ass gangster dude jumps on zombie’s back and hits him.]

Lovelock: Dude hits like my grandmother.  They just shot the thing thirty times and it’s still up and about and he thinks his limp-wristed whacks are going to… ?

[Head Gangster figures out to go head shot styles, with a shotgun.]

[...]

The cops and the gangsters decide to WORK TOGETHER, to try to get out of the building.  BEST FRIENDS.

[...]

[Weak Punch Gangster takes down two zombies with his bare hands.]

Lovelock: Where was that before?  I don’t know, movie, you’re being a touch inconsistent.

[...]

The movie trucks along.  There is a fair amount of action, and the dialogue is alright.  The problem?  The characters are ALL scumbags.  Even the cops are shitty cops and shitty people.  Hard to have a ton of fun when you’re not really rooting for anyone.

[...]

Lovelock: So I can root for shitty cops, evil drug dealers or this crazy racist old man that they just met?

Starkwell: Yeah, I’m actually hating the characters MORE as time is passing.

Lovelock: I’m starting to dig the chief gangster guy.  At least he’s staying cool.

[...]

A few twist and turns later, many more zombie kills and a bunch of dudes being eaten, head cop  finds himself at ground level, standing on a car surrounded by zombies, spinning around, with guns blazing like he’s in the Matrix.  Then he runs out of bullets and gets eaten.  Which leaves us with Crazy Old Racist, Head Gangster, and the Girl That Everyone Hates Because She’s A Mega Bitch.

[...]

Lovelock: Honestly, I really hope no one makes it.

Starkwell: That makes two of us.

[Three, actually.]

[...]

Head Gangster and Bitch make it out alive and BITCH SHOOTS HIM IN THE HEAD.  The end.  Roll credits.  It’s the fucking worst.  The worst character makes it. The worst.

Descendents.

Long before George Clooney played an upset widower, in “The Descendants”, there was a terrible Chilean movie called “Descendents” about a mysterious virus turning everyone into zombies.  Obviously the two have nothing to do with one another, but I really didn’t know how else to introduce a Chilean zombie movie that promises to be absolute garbage.  Have fun, kids.

[...]

[Kid narrates, describes the zombie apocalypse, a montage of children’s drawings show the evolution of the world.]

Starkwell: If your kid draws people vomiting blood, it might be time to get them some help.

Lovelock: Or lock your doors, ‘cuz LOOK OUT.

[Apparently the kid is immune and needs to find the ocean (?)]

Starkwell: Wait, is she dancing with a mermaid?

Lovelock: Why does her mom want her to go to the sea?  Dumb plan.

Starkwell: And… she’s supposed to find the magical octopus there?

Lovelock: I’m confused.

[It gets worse.]

[...]

Another montage shows the kid being experimented on, and show her seeing her mom get eaten, and… yeah, now she’s all alone on the beach or something.  They cram a lot into a super schizo intro.  And then it quiets down and we follow Camille, the young girl, as she wanders the wasteland alone.

[...]

[More young girl walking and narrating.]

Lovelock: If this whole movie is this girl walking around and telling us how lonely and hungry she is, I might lose my shit.

[...]

The good news, the movie is only about an hour and ten minutes.  The bad part, so far, it really is mostly just shots of the girl walking around and narrating a shitty screenplay.  Occasionally there are shots of her running away from soldier people… the zombies themselves don’t really scare her because she is immune to them and they don’t attack her.  But yeah, at a few points some army dudes are chasing her and her other immune children friends and trying to shoot them.  Not sure why.  There are a lot of flashbacks of when the world went to shit, but it doesn’t really explain anything, or really go anywhere.  Plus they keep repeating the same flashback, basically.  The zombie eating people parts are decent enough, and it’s nice to see someone tryng to do something different, but the problem is, it really wasn’t much of an idea at all.  Also I hate it.  Man fuck this movie.

[...]

[Ten minutes of a bunch of kids playing in a playground.]

Lovelock: I thought George Clooney was in this…

Starkwell: Why are they speaking English?

Lovelock: This movie blows.  So hard.

[Army shows up and starts shooting the kids.]

Lovelock: Well, at least that.

Starkwell: Wait, why is the army hunting children… and zombies?

Lovelock: I’d appreciate if the girl would stop having the same fucking flashback over and over again.  WE’VE ALREADY SEEN THIS.

Starkwell: HOLY SHIT, yeah we get it, you want to get to the sea.

[...]

Then the kids find the sea and there is a giant octopus that is swatting down the helicopters.  THEN THE GIRL TURNS TO THE CAMERA AND SHE AND HER FRIENDS HAVE TURNED BLUE, GROWN GILLS AND HAVE WEBBED FINGERS AND SPARKLE LIKE DIAMONDS.  Yes.  That happened.  Lovelock straight up passed out after trying to make a joke that simultaneously referenced “Avatar”, “Twilight” and “Waterworld”, and ran out of air.  When he came to, he legit screamed  “THE SMURFS” and then started speaking in tongues.

[...]

[After the credits, it tells us, through the worst fake news broadcasts EVER FILMED, that ten years ago GLOBAL WARMING… caused this?]

Starkwell: And… so…

[No, seriously, you don’t even know how bad the fake news broadcasts look.  The guy is reading his lines off of a piece of scrap paper, and one of the ‘broadcasts’ looks to be in someone’s wood paneled basement, and another one looks like they filmed it in a bar.]

Starkwell: Wait.. so…

[Seriously, this goes on for ten minutes.  After the credits.  Ten out of seventy minutes are after the credits.]

Starkwell: WHY IS THERE AN OCTUPUS WHY ARE THE KIDS SUDDENLY MERMAIDS??!?!?!?!

[...]

It’s one of the most frustratingly bad movies I’ve ever seen.  Must be seen to be believed.  That being said, don’t see it ever.