Reviewed by: Eric R. Lowther
Posted by: Root Rot
The Vanguard (2008)
Written/Directed by: Matthew Hope
Hey Kids, it’s Eric R. Lowther aka biguglyhairyscary back on the ole Witch’s Hat Blog with my take on “The Vanguard”, a 2008 release from writer/director Matthew Hope and released through Propaganda Pictures (an aptly-named company for this one, as we’ll see). This little “infected zombie” indie flik has received a lot of bad press and reviews since it came out, so let’s see what your old pal BUHS has to say…
Synopsis
The year is 2015, and the world’s in just a heapin’ pile of shit. We’ve managed to virtually exhaust the world’s oil supply. The Middle East has been attacked by most every power on the planet to try and plunder the last bits of black gold. We’re overpopulated, out of oil, out of food and out of potable water. It appears the one thing we’re not out of though are rich industrialists and other elites. An entity called “The Corporation” rises out of the chaos and takes it upon itself to solve all the world’s problems. It does this by creating a drug that makes all these teeming masses using up what resources remain into shiny, happy people. This lasts for about a month, until the drug turns the shiny, happy people into dim, dead people so they’ll stop using up all the good stuff. Of course, the plan is far too simple not to have a fatal flaw; instead of killing off the tired, huddled masses yearning to eat, drink and breathe it turns them into mindless “infected” zombies ala “28 Days” or “The Crazies” remake. They also become carriers to whatever sickness the drug induces, making its victims able to pass it on through fluid contact. To combat this problem, The Corporation creates an army surgically and chemically altered to be completely obedient to them to wipe out the infected population, dubbed “biosyns”.
Amid this dystopian, and message-heavy, background we meet our hero, Max. Max is one of the few non-infected humans left outside The Corporation’s city-state, known as “The Red Zone”. Max lives off the land and has made it his personal mission to kill as many biosyns as he can find running around his deep-woods home. Now, I can see where some of the reviews are coming from about this movie. There certainly is a good bit wrong here as far as plot holes and the clunky way the movie’s mythos is presented to us. However, the one thing that makes it work on any level is Ray Bullock Jr’s portrayal of Max. Here we have a thick-bearded loner with little more than a few hatchets, some improvised weapons, a tent and a bicycle to his name that lives his life only to kill biosyns. This is not what endears him to me, though. Though we hear Max in voiceovers, the character goes for almost the entire first hour of the movie (it should be noted that we don’t get ANY dialog from any character except for some biosyn screams and growls throughout the first 1/3 of the movie) without actually speaking a word. Bullock is able to convey more with simple body language and facial expressions than a lot of other actors can do with a script. Further, Bullock’s action sequences aren’t the slickly-choreographed hand-to-hand fighting we’re used to seeing. There’s nothing flashy or fancy about his fighting style save for a very few flourishes when unsheathing his hatchets. For the most part, he fights just as you would expect someone to fight that had to learn the hard, quick and dirty way. He attacks with more ferocity than calculation, but at the same time carries himself with an eerie calm. Bullock’s Max moves through his woods (and they are most certainly HIS woods, make no mistake about that) with a sure-footed grace and no wasted motions. He is either moving or still with no unnecessary movements, which is just what you would expect from someone that has to struggle for every morsel of food he gets.
Eventually, The Corporation’s army gets around to cleaning up Max’s woods. It should also be noted that every soldier is sporting a Mohawk. Why, you ask? Maybe Mr. Hope has a Mr. T fetish. Who knows? Anyway, one of their soldiers, Jamal, manages to find enough of himself after The Corporation’s chemical and electronic brainwashing to remove his implanted transmitter and go AWOL. He meets Max, who thinks the soldier’s there to kill him, and also meets one of Max’s improvised anti-personnel devices (spoiler; the IAP wins). Max takes pity on him and tends his wounds, and once conscious Jamal tries to explain to Max that the rest of the soldiers are, in fact, there to kill him as well as any biosyns they come across. This is made more difficult since Max decides to convince Jamal that he’s deaf. Why? Maybe he’s just grown used to living without talking. Maybe he has secrets that he’d rather not discuss and playing deaf is a good way to avoid questioning. Maybe he’s just being a dick. I won’t spoil that one for you.
As the movie progresses, we do get a few other characters involved and we find out that there may or may not be an organized resistance movement remaining in the world to battle against the fascist Corporation and its plans for world domination through conformity and really shitty bathtub Oxycotton. We also discover that there’s more to Max than meets the eye and his hidden, high-level ties to The Corporation. The trip to the climax does get a little muddy and some of the characters seem to get a bit lost with so little dialog to cling to, though, and once you get most of the pieces to the puzzle most of you can make some educated guesses as to how it will all turn out.
And now for the nuts and bolts of the thing. As I’ve said there’s really very little dialog here, with most of it coming as voiceover and from characters that pop up in the last half of the movie. That means it relies heavily on the actor’s abilities to convey their characters through what they do instead of what they say. This is something most actors aren’t all that comfortable with outside of a straight action sequence. The actors here handle this quite well, so well in fact that when some of them do get a chance to speak you almost wish they weren’t. It also means that the first half of the movie can feel a little slow and tedious at times since they don’t rely on dialog to pull you through it.
The movie is filmed almost completely out-of-doors which presents its own challenges, but Hope and company score well here, too. Some of the camera angles are really quite innovative and unique, especially for the two ends of the spectrum; the extreme close-ups and the wide, not-quite overhead shots. The whole film has a very subdued look which works for it, with even the vibrant colors of the forest muted in deference to our hero’s struggles. The physical effects are anywhere from poor to decent. The biosyns look good from a distance, and a few even up close, and there are some good gore scenes. However, the biosyns, while all rocking white-out contacts, rely primarily on what appears to be Sharpie-induced vein networks scribbled on their faces and necks. Personally I would’ve used the contact lens budget on better physical effects, but in a strange way it kinda works here. The extras playing the biosyns by and large do well with their bits and move and act like you would think a deranged, animalistic primate would (and ain’t we all at least a little deranged, animalistic primate?). The CGI is, unfortunately, crap, and serves as a really good example of really bad digital FX (note to filmmakers; I know it looks cool, but even when tracer rounds are used they aren’t used THAT much). What few props and sets that are imported to the woods were well thought-out and fit nicely into the theme, and there are few anachronisms for our heroes to rely upon for their survival.
So, is it any good? If you’re a zombie or infected fan you need to at least give this one a shot. Even with all its issues and heavy-handed message about corporate evils, our oil-based society and the military-industrial complex it still delivers some good, old fashioned lone-wolf zombie-killin’. Many of the performances are good, much better than what one would safely expect from this kind of project. If for nothing else you’ll want to see this for Bullock’s portrayal of Max, as it’s a far more realistic take on deep-woods survival and combat (though some of his traps do approach properly-constructed Wile E Coyote affairs. Maybe Max took the time to read the Acme instruction booklet?). This isn’t one you can put on and putter around the house with or work on something else and just glance at here and there, though. With so little dialog its one you’ll need to pay attention to fairly closely so you don’t miss the important bits. It’s also good to see an indie effort, regardless of its issues, that didn’t go the zomcom (fuuuuuuuck) route once in awhile as well in its zombie/infected portrayal, and it’s also refreshing to see action sequences that are rawer and somewhat more realistic in the genre. If this sounds like your thing, it’s a steal from Amazon at anywhere from $1.50-$10.00 for a used or new copy as well as similar pricing from your usual online sources. You can also rent it through Netflix or stream it right there from their site. If you’re not a stalwart zombie/infected fan, I would suggest you do just that before adding it to your permanent collection.
Well, that’s it for me. Make sure you’re poking around the rest of the site. Mr. Rot has added a whole bunch of new things around here, like a message board through Killer Reviews, a new monthly movie chat podcast with Misfit Boy and special guests and the new single-movie review podcast Joanie Loves the Witch’s Hat has proven to be quite popular as well. There’s also the Witch’s Hat Blogcast, where you can hear Mr. Rot, Keelie, Creepy Kyle, Misfit Boy and even the dulcet tones of yours truly talking about movies, books and just whatever the fuck we want. There’s a pile of new audio, video and text content virtually every week laying around here, and we do it all for you. So until next time this has been biguglyhairyscary saying, see ya, Kids.
Related Witch’s Hat links
Other Witch’s Hat movie reviews
Question or comments
The Witch’s Hat Voice Mail 313 444 2611
thewitchshatblog@gmail.com
