Written & Reviewed by: McBastard
Posted by: Root Rot
Vs. The Dead (2009)
Reviewed by McBastard of McBastard’s Mausoleum
Directed by: Phil Pattison & Jeff Beckman
LABEL: Midnight Releasing
REGION CODE: Region 1 NTSC
RATING: Unrated
DURATION: 90 mins
VIDEO: Anamorphic Widescreen
AUDIO: English Dolby Digital Stereo
CAST: Dave Montour Brett Hawley Peter Bridges Phil Fader Brandon Dean
TAGLINE: Let’s Kill Some Dead People
The god damned government, man! It’s a familiar chestnut when the government creates a reanimating agent called Round 2 designed to reanimate our dead soldiers who will continue to fight the good fight even beyond the doors of death. Of course this all goes terribly wrong during a live field test in Afghanistan as we see in a sweet pre-credit sequence, Taliban zombies – need I say more?.
Now we meet a couple of knuckleheads working for a FedEx type delivery service. They’re on a rural route in the God forsaken Canadian countryside looking to deliver tattoo pigments to an outta the way tattoo parlor. They pull up to the front door but unable to get an answer they decide to crush, crinkle and cram the over sized package into the mailbox. Not sure why they wouldn’t leave it at the doorstep but I’m quite sure this is how the postal service gets things done. In my experience any packages I’ve received that had the words “fragile” or “do not bend” stamped on it have been creased and crumpled, seemingly in spite of the special instructions.
As it so happens travelling that same stretch of rural road is a government van carrying the decommissioned R2 reanimating agent. To avoid a collision with the wildly swerving delivery truck the van swerves off the road and obliterates the mailbox spilling pigments as well as their own toxic contents onto the roadside. The delivery truck doesn’t even slow down but bio-suited and well-armed agents emerge from the van and clean-up the fiasco in a hurried manner. In a few quick moments they’re outta there but wouldn’t you just know it, they leave behind a cylinder containing R2 which just happens to look like a bottle of ink pigment. Later that day the proprietor (Justin Degagne) and namesake of Scratchie Dan’s awakens from a presumably drunken slumber and sets off to retrieve the mail. Upon discovering the remnants of what was once his mailbox he grumbles a bit and carries the inks, and the R2, back into his dilapidated shack.
Back in town we enter Baroni’s Pizza and are introduced to a trio of metal-punk skater delinquents who look like Bam Margera (Druff, Dave Montour) and Steve-O (Dee, Brett Hawley) of JACK-ASS, the third looking a bit like Joey Belladonna (Woody, Phil Fader) of thrash-metallers Anthrax. They’re getting hassled by some local jocks cuz we just gotta keep the stereotypes going, if indie zombie flicks aren’t gonna who will, I ask you? There’s a bit of a tussle and the shop proprietor, Pete (Chris Waldick), an obese grease-stain of a man intervenes, threatening to ban them from the shop, he also gives an earful to his counter-help Marcus (Brandon Dean) who is friendly with the punks.
The punks strike a deal with greasy Pete – if he’ll get a skull n’ bones tattoo of their design they swear to never return to Baroni’s, if not, they stay put. A design is quickly jotted down on a paper napkin and Pete takes ‘em up on the offer. They send him off to, where else, Scratchie Dan’s, assuming he’ll back out of the proposition. Pete arrives at Scratchie Dan’s to the sight of a health official looking to cite the establishment for violations, not a good sign. Upon entering the tattoo parlor we are treated to a cess pool of scum, this place is way scarier than anything we saw in Rob Zombie’s HOUSE OF 1000 CORPSES. It has the appearance of a white trash crack house that’s been pissed on by rats with diarrhea, the mere sight of it might just give you hepatitis C. Scratchie Dan mirrors the shop’s aesthetic, a crusty, sweaty, endlessly quotable scary redneck weirdo, fun stuff. The film would have us believe that Pete is so set on banishing the punks from the shop that he’s going to go through with it, but prepare to suspend your disbelief, no one of sane mind would continue, particularly after a nutty encounter between Scratchie and some hipsters doofuses. Of course Scratchie inks Pete with the R2 agent and Pete becomes becomes sickly ill.
Somehow managing drive back to the pizza shop he stumbles in disoriented, with a flop sweat and looking like death warmed over. He vomits and dies right on the floor in front of Marcus and the metal-punks. While the guys gather round his corpse figuring out what to do Pete comes back fully zombiefied and lunges at Dean, ripping his throat out in a wonderfully bloody scene, lots of bits of gristle being pulled away from the wound. Druff grabs a bat and bashes Pete’s brain in, ending his short reign of undead terror. Now the entire shop is covered in blood and brains, Dean’s infected and it’s up to them avert an apocalyptic zombie epidemic.
Adding to the shenanigans are two typically inept police officers, one obviously a not-so-closeted racist and his black partner who frequent the pizza parlor. Their inclusion in the film adds some fun comedic touches, happily it’s not as heinous as the Keystone cops of THE LAST HOUSE ON THE LEFT, plus we get sweet verbal nuggets like “I hate pedophiles just as much as I hate kids.”
Something that annoyed me, the effects of Round 2 is that the zombies won’t attack people they were friendly with in life, only those they hated. I get it, the reanimating agent was geared towards creating zombies who continued to fight the good fight but I think it just slowed the film down. Zombies hate the living, period, nom nom nom.
Something that didn’t annoy me but may others is the faux grindhouse style aesthetic of the film with digitally added vertical scratches, cigarette burns and discoloration to mimic an older film with a well-screened patina. I rather enjoyed it and think it’s better done here than most I’ve seen. I would be remiss not to mention a blazing metal, punk and psychobilly soundtrack featuring Sam Lawrence 5, Dayglow Abortions, Integrity, Red Harvest, Fog of Leprosy and many others, good stuff.
The film moves along at a good clip, assisted by the speedy soundtrack and some stylish editing which keeps things going at a brisk pace but there are a few slow bits that could’ve been easily excised. The film looks great, it’s an indie production but it’s one of the better looking ones, no worries there. The dialogue is snappy and memorable plus the gore effects do not disappoint on any level.
VERDICT: Indie zombie flicks are not exactly in short supply these days but this Canadian production mostly hit all the right notes for me, it’s not redefining the genre by and means but it’s a fun riff on a tired genre, a definite recommend.
http://www.midnightreleasing.com/index.php
Related Witch’s Hat links
Yah or Nay of the Day mini reviews
Question or comments
The Witch’s Hat Voice Mail 313 444 2611
thewitchshatblog@gmail.com
