Review of Undead
Marion
I came across this Australian horror flick the other night. It's a zombie flick called Undead that has generous doses of comedy sprinkled throughout the movie. The movie was cheesy -albeit, not Bloody Pit of Horror-style cheesy, but that in itself is a good thing- and it proved to be a fresh take on the unusual zombie plague scenario. This movie is written and directed by Michael and Peter Spierig, the two guys behind the upcoming hyped-up vampire movie called Daybreakers. See, I knew that would grab your attention!
Undead is your run of the mill zombie flick, but with a few rather interesting twists. This is a story of a small town in Australia being bombarded by meteorites. Heck with fallout and blocking out the sun, this shower has even worse consequences – folks start turning into zombies. So now you have a group of survivors trying to make sense of the situation while fending off the hungry zombies.
Must have braaaaaaiiiinnnnnnnnzz!
It is the direction of the movie as well as its group of quirky characters that make this movie worth watching. You get the nutty-as-a-lone-badger-type alien conspiracy theory guy, Marion, who has his own secret bunker and expected an onslaught of aliens. Turns out he was abducted once before, an experience that also resulted in his fighting off a zombiefish. That particular bit is a over-the-top cheesiness personified. Other characters include the cynical beauty pageant winner Rene, two jumpy police officers, the sour runner-up to the pageant and her significant other. And yea, in case you are wondering, the aliens are somehow linked to that fire shower and the subsequent zombie infestation.
So the movie follows the attempts of these freaked out survivors. These fight-or-flight moments are dotted with funny action instances of folks blasting away at zombies – my favorite bit was when Marion hooked himself, upside down, on the door frame and then targeted a throng of zombies. Classic, hamminess! Finally, after running backwards and forwards between a few locations, including Marion's house, his bunker and a convenient store, the survivors decide to leave town. Except they can't. Seems like a weird barrier is blocking off their exit from this town. Bet you didn't see that coming.
ReneThis is right about when fancy hood-wearing aliens pop up and beam up a few of the survivors. Well, you can't really call them a survivor if they ended up as alien test-subject, can you? So now, the rest of the creeped up and somewhat naked folk must fend off zombies and aliens? By the way, did I mention that the meteorite shower has resulted in acid rain and thus, most of the remaining folk prance around semi-naked or fully undressed? Funnily enough, none of that comes across as gratuitous nudity (much as most of the viewers would not complain if it was); rather, the way it was depicted simply added to the hammy moments. I've given away a lot of spoilers so I will leave the rest of the story for you to discover. Do they survive? Will we see the abducted folks again? And what's with the aliens and the 'beam me up, Scottie' moments?
