Review: Bridge of the Doomed

Text © Richard Gary / Indie Horror Films, 2022
Images from the Internet

Bridge of the Doomed
Directed by Michael Su
Mahal Empire; FilmCore; Spicy Ramen Productions; Blaen-Y-Maes Bootleg Films; Wicked Monkey Pictures; Gravitas Ventures
82 minutes, 2022
www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100046239651325

With four films out this year, director Michael Su is proving to be quite prolific. And the level of carnage he displayed in his recent Death Count  (2022) shows that he is not afraid to step up to the blood and gore. So. it makes sense that he would jump on the popularity of the zombie genre, especially after Army of the Dead (2021), and put his toe in the evisceration.

A group of soldiers are given orders to hold a bridge (A Bridge Too Close?) to make sure no one or any thing crosses it, especially since they are trying to curtail the zombie apocalypse. The film does not waste any time giving us what we are waiting for, full on splatter. There is a lovely mix of practical SFX and digital (including the erasure of star Robert LaSardo’s infamous neck tattoos).

Kate Watson

Most the soldier at the bridge range from a couple of interesting characters to some expendables. The lead in the film is one of them, Sgt. Hernandez (Kate Watson). Su likes to pick strong women characters and he does well here with Hernandez’s tough as nails yet likeable sergeant.

The zombies are not slow nor fast: they stumble along, but they are quick at the grab, and consistently overwhelm their prey with numbers as they seem to always travel in groups. This middle tone of fast vs. slow is a nice touch and gives the chance to be viewer-friendly to both sides of the debate.

The film is essentially broken into two parts which are intermingled. First, there is the HQ, which is run by General Vazquez (LaSardo), with some cameo work by Michael Paré as Colonel Charon (great choice of name: Charon was the ferryman of mythology who brought your soul across the River Styx). Nice to see Paré work, as always, even in cameo form, though there was a time he walked Streets of Fire. Just because it is the headquarters, however, does not mean it is immune from the occasional zombie horde attack.

Robert LaSardo

The second is at the titular bridge, which looks like at one time it was a railroad crossing. Either way, it is over a very treacherous and fierce river, but not as much as the munchers on the other side. Also on the wrong side of the river are a bunch of survivalists living in a commune without much brains among them. Political commentary about the right wing? Among this group is Susan (Sarah French; she was the lead in Dead Count,). A third of the way in, I am going to assume that at some point, the two groups of antagonists (soldiers and survivors), will work together.

And as if a multitude of teethers were not bad enough, there is some kind of growling troll under the very bridge that the army is to defend. Just keeps getting better when it strikes. The SFX good nice and gooey, and as I said earlier, there is a lot of it.

There is no reason given that I could tell (or missed) about why the zombie romp started, but honestly, does it really matter? Radioactive satellites from space? Chemicals? We pick up the story well into the effects, and that is what matters.

There is a very slight overtone of religiosity here, as talk among the survivors discuss the “End of Times” and “judgment.” However, it is not preachy or annoying, even for this atheist. It is more questioning what is going on in a wider scheme, than pointing a finger.

Michael Paré

The main cast handles the roles extremely well, and some of the tertiary ones not so much, but they are the equivalent of “Star Trek’s” “red shirts” and are really only there to, in the words of the original Willard (1971), “tear ‘em apart!”

One of the aspects I like about director Su is that he does not follow the formula of Act 1 to introduce the characters, Act 2 to present the situation, and Act 3 to contain the main brunt of the violence. No, he picks it up right from the beginning and keeps it cropping up throughout the film, actually making it more suspenseful than less because it could come at any time. There is a bit of exposition here and there, but it certainly does not get in the way of the “yum-yum-eat-‘em-ups.” Filmed in Nevada with a nicely diverse cast. I am quickly becoming a Su fan.

IMDB listing HERE  

Review: Monsters in the Closet

 Text © Richard Gary / Indie Horror Films, 2022
Images from the Internet

Monsters in the Closet
Directed by The Snygg Brothers (aka John Bacchus aka Zachary Winston Brown)
Purgatory Blues LLC; Gravitas Ventures
89 minutes, 2022
www.facebook.com/MonstersInTheCloset

Man, I have not seen a genre film shot in my home town of New York City in a really long time (though I do believe some parts were done in Pennsylvania). I would rather see it in a horror than something like “Blue Bloods,” to see the city streets and lights. You know there are going to be overview city “placement” shots of b-roll footage. And sure enough, one minute in…

This is actually an anthology film that is shot for this release, not cobbled together (I like both formats equally, FYI). It is kinda cool that the wraparound story itself has a prologue. Actually, calling it a wraparound is kind of inadequate, as it is also one of the anthology stories and is the key connector between the pieces. I love when they do that.

Jasmin Flores

Raymond Castle (Tom C. Niksson, aka Tom Cikoski), an annoying writer of horror short stories and collector of things macabre. I am sure other viewers than myself will be looking at the merchandise in the background and saying “I want that,” or “I have that.” The posters on the wall are for sexploitation obscurities like Rock ‘n’ Roll Frankenstein (1999) and An Erotic Werewolf in London (2006, starring Erin Brown, aka Misty Mundae.

The premise of the film is that Castle has used black magic to make his stories come to life if they are read aloud (a well-used and beloved trope, such as “Beetlejuice!” “Bloody Mary!” “Candyman!”). This results in his estranged daughter, Jasmin Castle (Jasmin Flores, who co wrote the wraparound with “Snygg”) coming into the picture as she tries to figure out just what is going on. Playing an audio file version Raymond created of his stories on his computer (titled – you guessed it – Monsters in the Closet), we start off with the short films.

For example, the opening salvo is a humorous and gory partial first-person POV zombie apocalypse, as we see a woman becoming a zombie from the perspective of said flesh-eater. We hear her thoughts in clarity as others see her as a creature. This was done, albeit in a different effect, in Wasting Away (aka Ah! Zombies!!; 2007). While this idea has been done before (e.g., the short “2 Hours” in 2012, sans humor), but this is smartly written and designed. As promised, this brings you-know-whats storming the Castle house.

Now, under – er – normal circumstances, one would stop with the stories right there, and Jasmin is too occupied to listen to more, so an unexplained disembodies hand (borrowed Thing from “The Addams Family” perhaps?) climbs the keyboard to start the stories going again while Jasmin has her space continuingly clustered by creatures of various sorts and the tale telling is on autopilot.

Other stories include an annoying couple (Carmilla Crawford, Luke Couzens) buying their first fixer-upper house and the slow build-up of tension and violence turning into a bit of body horror/torture porn as they try to bring it up to snuff with limited experience (“Well, I did have shop in High School…” he states). In another, a rich, out of touch and racist father (Phillip Green) and spoiled daughter, Tiffany (Jordan Flippo) – obviously modeled after Donald and Ivanka – who argue about a camping trip; she talks about mistakes she will make in the future, such as eating pizza with the wrong fork, a line that made me stop the film and laugh, having grown up in Italian Bensonhurst, Brooklyn, home of the best pizza, where slices are folded when eaten, with no utensils needed…but I digress… She is not the sharpest stick in the woods because of the stick up her jealous ass, leading to some dire actions in a version of Richard Connell’s “The Most Dangerous Game” (1924) – shades of Don Jr. and Eric. While no one gets shot on 5th Avenue, the philosophy remains the same.

Of course, they save the best and funniest for last. Seems Dr. Frankenstein (John Paul Fidele) and the Mrs. (a hysterical Valerie Bittner) – note that the film calls her “Mrs.” rather than “Ms.,” not me – live in…well, I won’t spoil the best joke in the film. After an accident, the “mad” doc does his Frankenstein magic and viola, etc., et. al, and so on, ad nauseum. It nicely uses purposefully cliché classical tunes like Edward Grieg’s “Hall of the Mountain King” and Maurice Ravel’s “Bolero” to give it a Universal Pictures oeuvre.

It is smart that the film casts a wide net in genres, with many classical monsters in one form or another, but in completely different contexts and sprinkled in witty writing. Raymond’s between-story ramblings sound a bit ad-libbed and peculiar, even here, but I’ll swim with the fishes (or elephant sized chickens…see the film).

While there is no nudity in the film, there is a bizarre sex scene and a whole lot of cleavage. The gore and blood are plentiful. The practical SFX runs from really gross and dripping, to cartoonish and, well, mannequin limbs. There is also some digital blood spurts added as well, "splashing" the camera lens. But that’s the thing about having a foundation of comedy, which hear varies from the dark to the whoopies!, and that is that it gives room for the cheese to ferment, and becomes more accessible and acceptable. If they used, say, a mannequin arm in a Saw film, for example, that would not fly, but in something like The Mask (1994), it makes room for drawing outside the lines.

Tom C. Niksson

The film looks pretty good. I was a bit concerned about the opening, honestly, with it’s use of primary lighting (red, blue, cyan), thinking it may be leaning heavily towards a Creepshow (1982) vibe, because this starts actually looking a bit like that, being an anthology and all, but as we move along, that type of dated lighting is curtailed and it is easier to focus on the stories rather than it trying to be “art.” That being said, there are some lovely shots here, that are atmospheric and artistic, but it doesn’t bludgeon you over the head (pun not intended) with it, but it is used sparingly throughout.

The previous film by “The Snygg Brothers” was Beaster Day: Here Comes Peter Cottenhell (2014), which I honestly have not seen, but I am going to at some point as it is on Tubi (the image of Peter Cottenhell is Raymond’s screen saver). Two things about the “Snygg Brothers.” The first is the “Snygg” collective is like the Ramones, where in the credits there is a bunch of first names followed by the other, such as Vincent Snygg. The Swedish word snygg means “handsome,” but I’m guessing in this case it may also be an acronym, like [??] New York [??] Group. As for the director, it is a pseudonym for a man who is basically known for directing adult fare, both soft and hard, but obviously has enough talent to give us, at this point two horror films that are nicely offbeat.

[Added later: I finally saw Beaster Day on Tubi, and while it is as stupid and silly as can be in a fun way, some of the writing is actually quite hysterical, and Fidele, who plays Dr. Frankenstein in Monsters, steals the film with his role as a mayor who is prescient in Trumpian political spin.]

IMDB is HERE

Review: Witness Infection

Text © Richard Gary / Indie Horror Films, 2021
Images from the Internet

Witness Infection
Directed by Andy Palmer
Mob Goo Productions; Petri Entertainment
82 minutes, 2021
https://www.facebook.com/witnessinfection

One way to look at this is as a comic mish-mash of “The Sopranos” (1999-2007) and Mob Boss (1990) meet “The Walking Dead” (2010-), with a touch of Street Trash (1987). The characters from Saturday Night Fever (1976) are also a good baseline for those presented. I can’t speak for anyone else, but that sounds like a fun combination, under the right helm.

We are introduced to two rival mob families from Jersey, who went into the witness protection program, and by an FBI mistake, both get sent to the same small city of Temecula, California, a real place, 85 miles driving distance south from Los Angeles (Hwy 10 to 71, then 15), known for its wine and resorts; it was also filmed in Lake Elsinore, 35 minutes away (up Hwy 15). But I digress… Needless to say, there are a lot of bowling shirts and jumpsuits. It all reminds me of growing up in Bensonhurst, Brooklyn, where the mob was omnipresent (my story is HERE). 

Vince DonVito, Jill-Michelle Melean, Robert Belushi

Rather than go to war and kill each other, they pull a Dark Ages type deal between them, where Carlo (Robert Belushi – Jim’s son) – who runs a pet grooming shop – and rival gang daughter Patricia (Erinn Hayes) have one week to get married, and then produce a kid. Neither is happy about this arrangement, especially Carlo’s co-groomer, Gina (ex-“MadTV” Jill-Michele Melean), who loves him. If you have already figured out where this goes, it will not matter in the long run.

To make matters even worse, Patricia is the girlfriend of Carlo’s goombah brother, Domonic (Bret Ernst). Shades of A Midsummer Night’s Dream! Rounding it off at this point is Patricia’s bestie and Carlo’s sister (I think), Filomena (Tara Strong, known mostly as a voice actor in some major roles, such as Harley Quinn/Barbara Gordon/Batgirl in various “Batman” cartoons such as “The Killing Joke,” and for the Bronies, she is Twilight Sparkle in “My Little Pony”), and along for the ride is Carlo’s older letch and cinephile cousin and (further) comic relief Vince (Vince DonVito), who has the best line in the film.

Tara Strong, Erinn Hayes

Anyways, there’s a popular street meat food truck selling sausage sangwiches that is having a disastrous effect on people, turning them into zombies, but while stumbling around can also be fast, and definitely with a George A. Romero-style hunger. Oh, and their skin starts to boil and melt, which is where the Street Trash comes in.

While the humor is mostly verbal and pretty consistent, it is worth paying attention because there are a lot of throw-away lines that are easy to miss, and are too good to ignore (even the groaners). Part of the fun is the many other film references, from the verbal mentioning of a few films from The Godfather (1972) to Blazing Saddles (1974), to the more subtle ones like two hit men (Joseph D. Reitman and another voice actor, Gary Anthony Williams) who seem to be right out of Pulp Fiction (1994), down to the suits, the ponytail, the silencers, and especially the nonsensical conversation. Then there’s Rose (Monique Coleman, from 2006’s High School Musical), presenting a fine Pam Grier/Coffy-like (1973) pose, right down to the shotgun, huge afro, hoop earrings, and cleavage; her meta-commentary on blacks in genre films is a hoot. It’s almost like you can make a drinking game out of “Name That Reference.” It is all part of the fun.

Monique Coleman

The first two acts, which are totally worth watching, is mostly comedy, but then the bloodbath starts in earnest in the third act. There is a huge body count, and copious amounts of blood, guns, gore, and guts. The gunshot blood spray looks to be pretty obvious CGI, though most of it is practical SFX, and looks spectacular.

Usually in a film like this, the tendency is to play the characters broadly – usually too much so – but director Palmer manages to squeeze out some really nice performances, even though a bit over the top in stereotypes. This is a good thing. It is not surprising to me, though, because the cast is well-seasons with large amounts of credits on IMDB. Coming out best are the leads, Melean and Belushi, with DonVito close behind. The whole cast is great, but these three stand out.

There is one rather large hole in the story, though: if the plan was to meld the two families with this arranged marriage, why couldn’t Patricia just marry Dom? It would certainly solve the problem. Oh, yeah, that would ruin the tension between the two opposing groups. That being said, this is one of the better zombie films I have seen in a while, especially in the comic vein (pun not intended).

Be sure to watch the end because there are a couple of epilogues and a question I had answered, which I will not give away. Heck, some of the credits are fun as well, especially toward the end. Chomp at the bit, and view away.

Review: The Trees Have Eyes

Text © Richard Gary / Indie Horror Films, 2021
Images from the Internet

The Trees Have Eyes (aka Dead Bounty)
Directed by Jordan Pacheco
Lock It Down Productions; Cyfuno Productions
75 minutes, 2020,
https://www.facebook.com/DeadBounty

There must be something in the water in the area between Boston, MA, and Providence, RI. The amount of cinema – especially genre films – is stunning. Directors Richard Griffin, Lenny Schwartz, Laura Pepper, Richard Chandler, and Alex DiVincenzo, among others, all come from this area, producing quality work. And let’s not forget Jordan Pacheco, who recently came out with the fun Blood Pi (2020; reviewed HERE, and available on TubiTV, etc.). 

Cate Carson and David Carpenter

We start off with five rough and tumble bail bondsmen/woman, also known as bounty hunters – four men and one woman – who scour out into the woods in search of their prey. They are an older gent, Henry (Timothy Patrick Quill), his son Junior (James Baker), Junior’s partner Hannah (Cate Carson), Colt (David Carpenter), and macho/toxic masculinity-embused Bosk (Tony Moran, the original adult Michael Myers in 1978’s Halloween).

They drive a car that has the slogan “It’s more fun if they run” and scratch marks for the numbers caught that is often used by prisoners in these kinds of films (four horizontal lines and one diagonal through them). They are searching for a(n alleged) murderer (and the only black member of the main cast), Darnel (Kevin O. Peterson).

Good mourning campters!

Sharing the woods with our hunters-select, are a group of really obnoxious youths who are camping out. This gaggle includes a lesbian couple, a straight couple, and two other women, including Clair (Alexandra Cipolla) who is the “flirty” one in the cheerleader outfit, Tucker (Johnny Sederquist in a somewhat cameo role), and the group is rounded out by one woman out for a nude nighttime swim. Most are sitting around the campfire, talking smack and one pretending to be “manly”: Randall (Alexander Gautheir, who starred in the comedic 2016 short “Trouser Snake”; reviewed HERE) is embarrassed that he was intimidated by the huge, gun carrying bounty hunters in front of his girlfriend, Samantha (Jacquelyn Fabian). Hell, I would have been terrified and not be ashamed of it…they were pointing guns). Anyway, considering the cheerleading duds, I’m guessing these over-agers are supposed to be in college. While this group is definitely more stereotypical of these films, it also increases the number of the future body count, so I’m okay with it.

It is obvious these groups are going to meet in other ways in the second act when the zombies start to attack. Yep, zombies. While they are the slow, stumbling Romero type (director Pacheco has stated that the 1978 version of Dawn of the Dead is his favorite zombie film, and rightfully so), they still manage to come out of freakin’ nowhere to kill and give a good jump scare or few. Once it starts, the attacks are relentless, which of course is part of the fun for the viewer, if not the characters.

Johnny Sederquist

The special makeup SFX looks great for a low budget release, thanks to a team led by Phil “Skippy” Adams, and including Eric Rodrigues, who graduated from The Tom Savini’s Special Makeup Effects School. When the carnage starts proper, the blood and gore flow generously.

Most of the characters, as I find to be true in films with large fodder casts, are not that likeable, other than Hannah and Colt, whom Cate and David, respectively, allow to show some empathy. Nearly everyone else is out for themselves, and that hubris often brings their downfall. And speaking of cameos, there is an enormously short one with Rhode Island stalwart actors Nathaniel Sylva and Jamie Lyn Bagley.

Tony Moran

There is a similar theme to Dog Soldiers (2002), as a group – including a military-style one – is lost in the woods and being hunted by blood-thirsty creatures, albeit zombies rather than werewolves. But the deadly end result is the same, except in this case, just because you kill a zombie does not mean you have killed the zombie. The undead are tricky that way.

Alexandra Cipolla

While this is certainly not a comedy per se, there are some giggle-worthy moments here and there, which are great fleeting tension breakers. Just what is the cause of this zombiemania? There’s a couple of guesses within the film, but it’s left open. Though a major lesson here seems to be that when the zombie apocalypse does occur, people are going to crash their cars if they drive on small roads, to make them easy pickings.

A nice aspect about this film is that when it reaches the point where it would probably end in most cases, that is just the start of the third act, as the survivors (won’t say who) end up in a farmhouse and gather more wood for the fire, or meat for the zombies, as it were. Pacheco has found some clever ways to keep the story and blood flowing, and it’s appreciated. Also, the last section really is the finest moments of a quite good picture overall. The blood red cherry on top of the gray skinned cake. And the ending looks like there could be more baking in the oven. Cut me up a slice.

The film is available on the likes of Amazon, Tubi and YouTube. As zombie films go, this one is worth checking out.

 

Review: Ever After (EndZeit)

Text © Richard Gary / Indie Horror Films, 2020

Images from the Internet

Ever After (aka EndZeit)

Directed by Carolina Hellsgård

ARTE / Das Kleine Fernsehspiel (ZDF) / Grown Up Films /
Juno Films / MVD Entertainment

90 minutes, 2018 / 2020

www.junofilms.com

www.mvdb2b.com

You say you’re looking for something lighthearted with zombies along the lines of Zombieland (2009)? Man, you’ve come to the wrong Blu-ray. However, if you’re looking for a deeply serious Euro-centric post-Z-Apoc universe where everything is dire, well, have I got the film for you!

When the film opens, the Z-Apoc happened two years previously, and in Germany, there are only two barricaded cities left. In one (Weimer), that I think of as Republican, the zombies are shot on site with zero tolerance. In the second (Jena), which I envision as Democrat, they are working hard to find a cure. We start off in the former, and meet our central character, (dyed) redhead Vivi (pop and soul singer Gro Swantje Kohlhof), who suffers from severe PTSD from an experience as the munching pandemic virus took a bite into humanity. We see it in snatches of flashback. She’s withdrawn and nearly child-like.

Gro Swantje Kohlhof and Maja Lehrer

She manages to get out of Republicanville and meet up with fellow ex-pat Eva (Maja Lehrer), who is also running away after an incident. Eva is the opposite of Vivi in that she’s hard as nails and not exactly cuddly. They both decide to try to make it to the Democrat land by cutting through the Black Forest.

Along the way, Vivi befriends an older, mother-figure type (Tryne Dyrholm, who played the title role in 2017’s Nico, 1988). She’s a philosophical flower child who sees what is happening around the globe in a specific purpose as part of the natural world. Of course, we don’t really know what set off the Z-Apoc, whether natural or man-made, but it is all part of what nature is, according to her (I’ll leave most of her philosophizing for when you see it).

For this adventure, the zombies are fast, growl like beasts as their only verbal communication, and of course are ruthlessly vicious with no sense of their previous personhood. Like sharks, they’re mindless machines lookin’ for a snack of gristle and gore. An odd thing about that is even though there are some cringe-worthy moments, this is definitely not Fulci-like. It is more story-driven, so there is a dependence on character development rather than focused on shots of viscera.

There is also a philosophy that runs throughout, and that is to ponder what our place is in a world in which society as we know it is no longer strong enough to support us. Everyone seems to be searching for an answer to that, either directly or unconsciously.

In other words, while the zombies are fast, the storytelling mostly is not. There are thrilling moments where it’s do-or-die with Vivi and Eva against either single snackers or a group of them (or, horde, as the case may be).

Although essentially a three-person film, this is mostly Vivi’s story, and we basically see it through her eyes. It’s a world that is both harsh and beautiful as she mentions that one can see the stars again.

Despite the zombies roaming around snackin’, this is a very slow-moving film that makes Hereditary (2018) look like Mad Max: The Road Warrior (1981). This isn’t something you just pop in for a quick fun ride on a Saturday afternoon in your mom’s basement, this is a piece of cinema that is quite serious and deep, albeit that it keeps up the tension. I enjoyed it a lot, but it took some thinkin’ work to get through it all.

In German with subtitles, this picture is essentially a three-person piece, and except for the flesh eaters, all the main characters and most of the secondary ones are female. Director Carolina Hellsgård presents a bleak world yet filled with beauty, as I said, and takes us on a physical and philosophical journey that needs to be taken one step at a time.

The extras are chapters, sound choices, and two versions of the trailer: the original German and English. My one real complaint about the film is that although I’m happy to have the subtitles, they are pure white and small, and hard to read more than I would like, especially with a film this deep in its dialogue. Plus Vivi wears a white top and if the subtitles are superimposed on them, it’s damn near impossible to make out.

I’m not surprised this has won some festival prizes as this is the kind of film the serious viewers are itching for, rather than some found footage goofball release. With patience and thought, it’s worth a gander.

Review: Virus of the Dead

Text © Richard Gary / Indie Horror Films, 2020

Images from the Internet

Virus of the Dead

Complied by Tony Newton; directed by Matthew Joseph Adams; Gordon Bressack; James Cullen Bressack; Dan Brownlie; Jarrett Furst; Keiron Hollett; Matt Twinski; Benjamin James; Hunter Johnson; Christopher Jolley; Jason Lorah; John T. Mickevich; Mark Alan Miller; Kiko Morah; Tony Newton; John Penney; Shawn C. Phillips; Nick Principe; Timo Rose; Shane Ryan; Emir Skalonia; Steven S. Voorman

Vestra Pictures / Wild Eye Releasing / MVD Entertainment

102 minutes, 2018 / 2019

www.wildeyereleasing.com

www.mvdb2b.com

Tony Newton is a Brit who loves to keep his hands in the horror field, including books, poetry, documentaries, fiction films, and so on. For this anthology, he came up with a great idea: he had people involved in the genre create their own little films ranging from short, solo bits, to longer ones with some narrative to them. Then he strung them together to create a worldwide epidemic, and generate the ultimate found footage zombie collection.

The film starts with the “headline” act, “American Virus,” starring and co-written by Katheryn Eastwood. Rather than talking to an empty chair like her dad, she converses with the camera with a snide “fuck you” attitude as she and her cronies are the ones to start the outbreak via injections for… revolution? Disruption of the status quo? I’m not sure, but whatever the reason, it’s bloody, quickly edited, and with lots of motion of the camera. In fact, in some of the clips, there is a risk of motion sickness worse than Cloverfield (2008) or The Blair Witch Project (1999), other times completely steady, sometimes including digital “noise.”

Most of the pieces are filmed on cell phones and laptops, with the files uploaded to Newton. These clips are international, so occasionally there’s another language (with translation), which makes the varied perspectives additionally interesting. More often than not the person on the other end is talking directly to the camera with swings around to show what’s going on near by them, expressing different levels of desperation. Which brings me to my next point.

Some of the pieces are stand-alone, and others are serial. What I mean by that is there are sections that come and go with a single filming. Some of the more interesting ones are those that come back at different times as situations worsen. For example, there is a series of segments with horror actor/vlogger Shawn C. Phillips: in the first, he’s taking the whole thing pretty casually, locked down in his basement with his film collection, figuring he’ll just wait it out. But each time we come back, food and water is running low and eventually there’s no electricity; it gets more and more dire. Another, “Face to Face,” has a couple who are Skyping (FaceTime? We Chat?) while he is in the States and she is in Myanmar (“I panicked,” for those who get the reference). Each time we come back to them – and this really is one of my fave pieces, – the situation goes from “what the hell” to sheer terror, bit by bit.

What comes out in the long run is people trying to adjust into a “new normal” as the world eats itself up, and trying desperately and literally not to be on the menu. This new reality is actually what television shows like “The Walking Dead” and films like ZOO (2019) are about, as much as the zombie apocalypse. Different people react to the situation in various ways, the oddest one being a couple of horror wannabe filmmakers who gleefully film killing zombies for their “epic.” But who is going to watch it “with the world in a grave” as the P.F. Sloan song “Eve of Destruction” posits?

At least the film occasionally deals with camera batteries dying as electricity starts to begin waning, as would happen. It’s a pet peeve of mine in found footage when people film for days on one battery. I have to recharge my phone daily, and I don’t usually use the movie features. And don’t get me started about the energy it takes to upload all these videos that the dying world is posting to a server no one is watching over.

There’s a couple of things that I find interesting, one directly and one larger than the film itself. First, even with a multitude (legion?) of different filmmakers and styles, there generally is a similar pattern, either the characters running around with the camera/cell phone, or with the camera mounted and pointing directly at the person of focus. I’m sure with some, it’s actually taken directly from the laptop camera on the top of the monitor, but no matter what the source, there is a consistency in the pattern of how the film is done. Found footage has become as much a staple of the horror genre as selfies, in general. This is a mixture of both.

What I find most fascinating, though, is the thought behind the need to film oneself, even as the world is dying. As a culture, we have become so inundated by not just the selfie, but the mentality behind it that has us believing we all matter and the world is going to care what we have to say, even if it endangers oneself or those we love (case in point the father who keeps filming his wife and his new spankin’ kid even as the undead are metaphorically breathing down their necks).

If the world is actually in the middle of the Z-Apoc, it’s just a very short matter of time before society as we know it ends, and the means for anyone else to see what you have filmed will be gone with it. That we would feel the need to keep on shooting the video selfie to show everyone / anyone / no one we ever existed is futile. Even if the footage remained beyond your body’s existence, who would have the means to see it? As much as this is a fictional film about zombies, it is also an exercise in just how vain and egocentric we are.

Just go to YouTube and check out videos people make of themselves in confrontations with others in parking lots, stores, fast food restaurants, etc., shouting, “I’m putting this on YouTube!,” hoping for it to go viral. Well, when the Z-Apoc goes literally viral, you and what happens to you is like dust in the wind. As I said, it is this mentality that I find really fascinating about this film, whether purposeful as a sociological study or just an exercise in anthology.

The gore is plentiful throughout, with some pieces being more so than others, most of it looking quite spectacular – my fave was a zombie ripping the skin off someone’s back. Most anthologies are kind of hit and miss, but this one is actually quite good throughout, with very few submissions that didn’t work, such as one where a guy is talking very slowly with the camera just inches from his face; luckily, it’s pretty short.

This is a fine effort that deserves to be added to the zombie canon, and I recommend it as everyone on this film is obviously a fan of the genre, and have contributed their love for it as a bigger body of work.

Review: ZOO

Text © Richard Gary / Indie Horror Films, 2019

Images from the Internet

ZOO

Directed by Antonio Tublin

The Orchard / PingPong Film / Logical Pictures

95 minutes, 2019

Paul Simon once famously sang, “Love emerges and it disappears / I do it for your love.” That’s a tidbit to hold onto in this zombie apocalypse dramady taking place in London, though it’s origination is from Scandinavia (Demark and Sweden), though filmed in English.

Well, zombie is debatable. As with 28 Days Later… (2002), the world is infected with a virus which turns people into wild flesh eaters (“fast zombies”), but the debate can be later discussed on whether these are technical zombies because we’re not really sure if they are still alive. I’m not gonna touch that question or discussion at this time.

We are introduced to very attractive couple John (Ed Speleers, best known for Eragon in 2006 and “Downtown Abby”) and Karen (Zoë Tapper, who has appeared in several British programs such as “Mr. Selfridge” and “Demons,” where she played Mina Harker).

When the infection shebang hits the fan, they are in a strained relationship due to not being able to reproduce their beauty to children (my snide take on it, not the films), so they are stuck in their high-rise apartment waiting for rescue while the world explodes around them. They hunker down with food they’ve stolen from other apartments, and apparently a vast amount of wine and various hard drugs.

These tight quarters, of course, force them to refocus their relationship and rebuild their bodies to fight whatever may come through the door, and relearn about each other. The dialogue is witty and there is a strong, dark sense of humor about it all.

But while the world turns dark, strangeness also is rising in John and Karen’s haven during the second act a third of the way into the film when a couple from the building that they don’t know (but whose apartment they pillaged) show up at their door asking for help. Reluctantly, they let that other variance of evil in, in the form of Emily (Antonia Campbell-Hughes) and Leo (Jan Bijovet). This second couple see what our heroes have, and plan to do whatever it takes to make it their own, in their version of murder and pillage…but who’s the stronger and willing to risk the most?

But this is only one set piece that includes roving gangs, intimate dialogue, and yes, those pesky zombies that are only present in the storyline on occasion, though they are the spine to the entire story.

This is not 28 Days Later…, which is wide roving through London. This is more personal and claustrophobic as nearly all scenes are shot in their apartment, and as other characters may come and go, John and Karen and their travails and swirling relationship are the focus of the story.

There is definitely some violence and blood, but no more than you would see in a gritty crime drama, but because its so sparse, it also makes it even more effective in a little-is-more way. Sometimes the violence comes as absolutely shocking, other times you’re cheering it on, as this couple delve ever further into a symbiotic unit that focuses on what must be done, while the mayhem also robs them of their social humanity piece by piece.

That’s what makes this a smart film, in that the presence of zombies are always felt, but rarely seen, and the story focuses on the cultural breakdown while waiting for that rescue. Survival is a strong master, and one does what one must; it’s the human imperative. And yet through it all there’s the intimacy and tenderness.

The one thing that drove me crazy about the story, though? And Jeez, I know just how petty it is, is as follows: our intrepid couple in the high rise are stuck there for a long yet undefined time, and yet the electricity never goes out. In a real crisis where society has completely broken down? I’d give it a couple of days, max, even with the generators and batteries.

Well, despite that last paragraph rant, this is a strong film that wisely refuses to take any one direction of thriller or romance, but manages to have extended periods of both, and they make it work. Of course, the quality of the actors and a strong direction by Tublin also help.

If you want a bloodfest, this is not the zombie film you are looking for; if you want a deeper story with some human emotion, well, it’s worth checking out.