The Science Fiction Horror and Fantasy Film Review
The zombie film is one of the most popular sub-genres of the horror film. A zombie is a reanimated corpse that has returned from the dead, slow, shuffling and lacking will. In the modern incarnation, the zombie has become a creature ravenous for human flesh.
The idea of the zombie comes out of African religion. The first ever zombie film was White Zombie (1932) and for the next 36 years, the zombie remained in the province of Voodoo, occasionally a creature of mad science or created by alien invaders. There it was slow, shuffling reanimated corpse but never more than that.
The modern zombie film began with George Romero’s Night of the Living Dead (1968), an apocalyptic film about the dead risen and laying siege to the living in a farmhouse. This made the zombie into a flesh eater and created the popular mythology about it only being able to be killed by incapacitating the head. This created a number of imitators but the true popularity of the zombie film grew in the 1980s following Romero’s sequel Dawn of the Dead (1978), which added copious gore and splatter to the mix. There were a number of enthusiastic imitators in particular from Italy. The 1990s saw the first zombie comedies.
The zombie film underwent a revival in the mid-2000s with a series of works that remade or homaged Romero’s films and others that claimed to be spurious sequels. This was followed by a vast shuffling horde of mostly low-budgeted zombie films. During this time, we have seen zombie films from almost every film-making country in the world.
These low-budget copies soon revealed that the number of original plots available to the zombie film was limited. This period also saw an upsurge in the zombie comedy and by the 2010s this evolved to a series of gonzo takes where filmmakers mixed zombies up with the most absurd title or conceptual mashups. By the end of the 2010s, the gonzo zombie film too had started to run out of ideas.
Sequel to the hit multi-director anthology has a less high-profile line-up of directors, nor hits the astonishingly perverse heights of its predecessor. As always some entries never do much but the film finds its stride in the last few episodes
A halfway decent Asylum film that emerges better than the film it is ripping off, the overblown Abraham Lincoln, Vampire Hunter. The film does the historical crossover aspect with some ingenuity
Steven Seagal tries to extend his career by taking on the zombie film. However, this is routine on all levels, although to its advantage Seagal is not on screen much
The second film from Fred Olen Ray who has become a prolific B-budget director since. This is a zombie film, a copy of the original Dawn of the Dead, slapped with a SF title to popularise on the then recent success of Alien
A charming and delightful South Korean zombie film about the friendship that grows across the gap separating them between a nerd trapped in an apartment and a girl in the building opposite during a zombie outbreak
The first film of directors Lucky McKee and Chris Sivertson, concerning a troupe of cheerleaders who are killed and resurrected from the dead. The two later returned to conduct a better-budgeted remake
English-language version of the Korean zombie film #Alive about a guy stranded in an apartment during the zombie apocalypse trying to communicate with the girl across the street
A French-Spanish film in which a group of troubled youths escaped from a reform centre only to discover that all the adults around them have become zombies
A ridiculous American conservative satire that turns Dickens’ A Christmas Carol into a heavy-handed farce where a Michael Moore lookalike is made to see the error of his liberal ways
Modest, low-budgeted British film about people trying to survive in the aftermath of a catastrophe. A zombie film that has borrowed a few leaves from A Quiet Place
This claims to be the first zombie musical. Surprisingly enough, it isn’t. A cute idea but you have the sense the only musical the filmmakers had seen beforehand was High School Musical
From the notorious 1970s/80s period of Italian cinema, this was listed as one of the notorious Video Nasties. This features a lone cannibal killer amok on a Greek island amid plentiful gore
Antisocial, a horror film about zombies created by social media, proved a reasonable hit. This is a sequel that skips on a few years after the collapse of civilisation
A zombie apocalypse that occurs via social networking sites??? To the film’s credit, it makes such a wacky idea plausible but the low-budget leads to a zombie apocalypse that mostly occurs off-stage
Big-budgeted Spanish-made zombie film based on a best-selling book. Very much a post-Covid depiction of the zombie apocalypse, this rehashes the familiar basics capably well
Shinji Aramaki’s immediate sequel to his reboot of the Appleseed franchise. This lacks the visually stunning qualities of its predecessor and seems more conceptually muddled but Aramaki eventually gets it together
The Asylum produces a sequel to Zoombies. While the original featured zombified zoo animals, this time we get an aquarium of zombified marine life
Sam Raimi and Bruce Campbell make their third Evil Dead film. The series hit a peak with the delirious balance of horror and comedy in the second film but here the comedy over-balances and becomes too broad
Zack Snyder makes a zombie heist film that if nothing else overspills with interesting ideas and a comic energy that goes along way to forgiving Snyder for trashing George Romero in Dawn of the Dead
Prequel to Army of the Dead set around the character of the German safecracker as he is dragged into conducting an impossible heist
A real Grade Z film. A mind-boggling stew involving John Carradine conducting mad science experiments, technical gaffes aplenty, spy capers featuring Tura Satana and even M.A.S.H.‘s Wayne Rogers on script
You feel that a film about lesbian Japanese schoolgirls vs zombies should have been more interesting. The zombies barely mount to a dozen and the director seems more preoccupied by his softcore predilections
One has seen just a few too many wacky titled zombie comedies and this Austrian film seems another wannabe until the climactic scenes where it redeems itself with a completely demented bloodbath
Seemingly another ridiculously titled zombie movie but in actuality this is no more than a regular zombie film played straight that has been slapped with a gonzo title as a selling point
One of the more amusing titles in the gonzo zombie title mashup fad. On the other hand, this takes itself surprisingly seriously and, while well made, never fully goes for broke
Despite a title that resembles more a 1990s killer cyborg film, this is actually a zombie film. Made soon into the mid-2000s zombie revival, this is driven more by fannish enthusiasm and copious gore than anything else
Just when the zombie genre seemed to be creatively exhausted, this is one of the freshest takes in some time. This does nothing radical with the basics, just offers a series of wry, sharply written vignettes as two bored slackers greet the apocalypse
Bollywood conducts a reasonable attempt to make its own equivalent of the zombie film in this mini-series about people at siege from undead British colonial soldiers awakened
Unfunny comedy set around a morgue where a mad doctor has found a process to resurrect the dead. Sort of like Night Shift crossbred with a PG-rated version of Re-Animator
One of the key films of cult Italian director Lucio Fulci, a gore-drenched but plotlessly incoherent mishmash about zombies emerging as the gates of Hell are opened
The second sequel to the cult splatter hit Re-Animator is a superior effort to its predecessor Bride of Re-Animator, getting the original’s sense of black humour down pat and arriving at a memorably apocalyptic climax
Strippers and zombies Japanese style. An entry into the Gonzo Japanese Splatter film fad. Cheaply made, with surprisingly little nudity and a whole lot of tongue-in-cheek splatter
Mark Polonia has been producing ultra-cheap horror films since the 1980s and developed a reputation as the worst directors currently working. This does not disappoint on what you expect
Hong Kong comedy with a police station under siege from zombies. The emphasis is more on comedy than the horror element
Birdemic was a cult bad movie – incredibly, despite the better budget that must have come his way, James Nguyen has gone and made the same thing filled with laughably flat dialogue and the worst effects ever seen on screen
A horror comedy that goes the next logical step and turns Black Friday shoppers into a zombified horde. With Bruce Campbell as a store worker who steps into the fray
This had me sold from its premise of American Indians vs zombies. Made by Canadian First Nations people, this features an Indian reservation as the last refuge against the zombie apocalypse
A little-known zombie film in which marijuana crop-dusted with an untested pesticide turns hippies into zombies. Listed as a Video Nasty in the UK
Yet another zombie film. This one headlines porn star Alexis Texas in a regular acting role. Low-budget and tame on the gore front but with some often wryly amusing characterisations
Part of the 80s/90s fad for makeup effects driven popcorn horror – in this case, actually directed by an effects artist. The film moves slow as molasses but the giant zombie poodle and zombie Phyllis Diller do compensate
Film about a marijuana crop grown using zombie brains as fertiliser. This starts with a promising gonzo zombie film tone but never quite sustains its approach
Low-budget film with Bela Lugosi as a respectable psychology professor who disguises himself as someone running a soup kitchen from which he runs a criminal operation and keeps zombies
One of wittiest titles of the 2000s zombie revival fad – the suggestion of a high school love story gone really wrong. This actual film is a surprisingly ordinary and unexceptional effort
Not to be confused with the Peter Jackson Braindead, although the similarity of titles only emphasizes how weak and unfunny this 1980s splatter homage comedy is in comparison
A Quebecois (French Canadian) zombie film about the residents of an island being turned into zombies by a fertiliser used on the golf course
One of Peter Jackson’s early films, which is maybe the funniest zombie comedy ever made. This becomes a work of unparalleled genius in the glorious gore-drenched excesses it reaches for
This is in essence a zombie film version of the classic historical film Zulu with a small group of soldiers tasked with protecting a bridge against a zombie horde
A revival of the Nazi zombie fad, which essentially becomes a First Person Shooter film as someone wearing a GoPro camera runs through a bunker dispatching zombies
An entry from Italian exploitation cinema’s early 1980s fad for zombie films, this has been put together with no other intent than providing a progression of extremely gory set-pieces
Joe Dante makes a zombie comedy. Dante is in his element and the film overspills with classic horror references but Dante feels like he is playing slow catch up with what the zombie genre has become
Joss Whedon scripted work that is less a horror film than a meta-horror film that is constantly deconstructing the genre and subverting its cliches. A rare genre entry less about visceral impact than it has brains to spare
Entry in the notorious Italian cannibal genre of the late 70s/early 80s. Here the recent hits of Dawn of the Dead and Apocalypse Now are merged in a plot involving zombified Vietnam veterans
An Australian effort that feels like a zombie movie version of Walkabout with an infected Martin Freeman wandering the Outback searching for someone to care for his infant daughter before he succumbs
Adaptation of the Stephen King novel about zombies created by a cellphone signal. Critically panned but this kicks in with a sensational opening scene and overspills with more fascinating ideas than it has room to deal with
Forgotten effort from the heyday of devil children films (The Exorcist, The Omen et al). This takes place in a backwoods setting and has a director who is determined to pile on atmosphere frequently to the point of overkill
Night of the Living Dead-influenced cheapie about zombified children wearing black nailpolish who blow their parents up with deadly hugs. This seems to have no ambition beyond providing entertainingly cheesy and preposterous meltdown effects every few minutes
In the same vein as Grindhouse, four filmmakers have come together to make an anthology of spoof horror films that homage the drive-in tradition. Good taste is left well behind and the results are both outrageous and funny
That rarity of rarities – a quite good Troma film. The zombies are not up to much but the titular girl motorcycle gang are surprisingly well rounded characters
An anthology that offers a quartet of Christmas horror stories, including ones of zombified elves and a Krampus monster. The overall effect though is of a slickly made effort that disappears without memorable distinction
Originally intended as a Demons sequel, director Michele Soavi decided to head in more arty directions. Imagine a Demons sequel mounted with the artistic ambitions of producer Dario Argento’s Three Mothers films
One of the key films in the cult of Lucio Fulci, a zombie film driven by a series of gore-drenched set-pieces. On the other hand, there is the complete lack of a plot holding everything together
Beyond the title, this is a straightforward take on the modern zombie comedy. It is undeniably trying to be another Shaun of the Dead, at which it proves consistently amusing and likeable
Zombie film made on a shoestring micro-budget from the point-of-view of a young man as he transforms into a zombie. The guerrilla approach results in an amateurism but also a work made with more imagination than you expect
Lucio Fulci departs from the splatter genre to make a venture into the Italian sword and sorcery film of the era. As with any Fulci film, this is expectedly plotless and incoherent but with occasional moments of imagination
Early Mike Mendez film that quickly abandons being a standard venture into a haunted convent and launches into an entertainingly over-the-top splatter show filled with zombified nuns
A very funny film about a horde of zombie schoolchildren. Co-written by Saw‘s Leigh Whannell, this has a great deal of fun deflating zombie cliches and is wittily on the ball in its characterisations of the teachers
A Charles Band film that has the distinction of being the first film released during the Corona Virus Pandemic of 2020. You watch out of curiosity of how the usual logistics of filmmaking deal with quarantine and social distancing
George Romero’s underrated classic gets a makeover amid the 00/10s fad for remakes of 70s/80s horror films. Alas, Romero’s modest classic about a madness-inducing biospill has a big-budget thrown to emerge as just another zombie film
Atomic became the explain-all buzzword for almost every monster movie of the 1950s.This is the novelty of the one and only atomic zombie film, although at heart is no more than a 1940s mad scientist film
The zombie genre has become creatively exhausted. This is one of the most original takes yet that asks what would happen if a cure were found but the zombies returned to life with full memory of everything they had done
A revival of the popular 1970s Blind Dead series about Knights Templar zombies. In this era of zombie films homages and remakes, it is a surprise nobody has thought to do so before
An ambitious low-budget variant on 28 Days Later featuring some excellent effects, where a man wakes up with amnesia to find zombies have overrun society
George Romero’s successor to his cult hit of Night of the Living Dead. Romero creates a very different film, one that takes place in a mall and comes with a level of droll satire. A bigger budget allows him to push things to gore-drenched extremes
Zack Snyder debuts with a remake of the cult George Romero film. While this has a bigger budget, it is missing is the satire and gore-drenched effects that made the original memorable. This inspired the mid-2000s zombie film revival
By its very title, this is a mummy film that is trying to exploit Dawn of the Dead. Once the mummies are revived this is to all intents and purposes another in the fad for extremely gory Italian zombie films
The third and most undervalued of George Romero’s original trilogy of zombie films, an explosively bared to the bone series of apocalyptic confrontations containing some of the best performances and writing in any of his films
A remake of George Romero’s third and most underrated zombie film, This came out as part of the 2000s revival of the genre but majorly miscalculates the original and emerges as wrong in just about every way
Made during the mid-2000s zombie revival, this is a cheap, badly made film that tries to cling to any kind of relevance to the George Romero name. If anything it is more like a sequel to Night of the Living Dead than to Day of the Dead
One of a growing industry of zombie films that leech off the George Romero name. This remakes Romero’s Day of the Dead, which means it cherry picks key elements and rearranges them in a different way but lacks everything else that Romero offered
The Dead was one of the better modern zombie films, depicting the African continent as it succumbed to the zombie apocalypse. This offers nearly the same story but moves the locale to India
A zombie film that stands out from shuffling horde by dint of the fact that it takes place in Africa and is a survival horror work that takes itself seriously rather than tongue-in-cheek. Low key but achieves some often haunted effect
Madness/zombie outbreak film set in a radio station as a talkback host watches the catastrophe unfurl outside. This only cheaply goes where the far superior Pontypool did first
After writing the huge hit of Alien, Dan O’Bannon next went onto this strange zombie film in which the people of a small town fail to stay dead
This could easily be called Cowboys vs Zombies. A low-budget effort that is tame on the zombie front but makes great effort and is served by some well-drawn characters
The second of British director Andrew Parkinson’s remarkable kitchen sink zombie films about people trying to deal with ordinary life while transforming
Largely forgotten tv movie featuring a Robert Bloch script. Curtis Harrington creates a fascinatingly creepy atmosphere that blends a recreation of the tropes of film noir with mysterious happenings involving voodoo and the resurrected dead
Jim Jarmusch is one of the foremost American independent directors and makes films that come with a dry, deadpan wit. The question as Jarmusch makes his first zombie comedy is what can he bring to a genre that has been in full-on self-parody mode since Shaun of the Dead in 2004
Made not along after the success of Lethal Weapon, this offers a wacky spin on the buddy cop formula having a cop paired with a zombie. The mildly amusing notion is killed by the excruciating comedy relief of Joe Piscopo
An enthusiastic Irish-made copy of the George Romero zombie film that vies between the amateurish and occasional moments of interest
Sam Raimi gave some money to independent filmmaker J.R. Bookwalter to see what he would do. The result is a modest and gory if amateurish copy of George Romero’s Dawn of the Dead. Nothing standout but Bookwalter has since gone on to become a regular director/producer of low-budget fare
A typical 80s film with a mad doctor resurrecting the dead in the abandoned wing of an asylum amid gory makeup effects. The first film from Brett Leonard who next went on to make The Lawnmower Man
Dead Rising was another zombie survival horror videogame from the creators of Resident Evil. Although nowhere in the stratosphere of the Milla Jovovich films, this was the first of two films based on the game
One among the vast shuffling horde of zombie films that has deluged the genre since the mid-00s. This is an average entry in the field, competently made and with a plot that you feel could have served as an entire season of The Walking Dead
The zombie film is feeling very played out these days. This is a no expectation entry (even the title seems utterly generic) that proves an unexpected delight, filled with endearing characterisations
Whether we asked for them or not, the Nazi zombies from Norway are back. Actually a better film than the first – while the script lacks even a basic plausibility, the film is far more polished, the black humour more outrageous and the splatter effects are at the top of their game
A revival of the Nazi zombie film from Norway! A hugely gore-drenched effort from Tommy Wirkola that soon plants tongue in cheek.
Animated spinoff of the popular Survival Horror videogame. Your first impression is that animation is not the best format for a gore-drenched film. One’s misgivings are promptly silenced by the wildly phantasmagoric range of creatures the film throws at you
Completely insane Japanese film about man-eating killer sushi. A film that has a whacko anything goes lunacy to it, resulting in some of the most surreally crazed monster movie scenes that this author has seen in some time
Not to be confused with the Stephen King novel/film. A zombie film with a military focus, one of several that appropriates the basics of Escape from New York as a tactical unit is sent into an infestation zone to retrieve an antidote
Amid the zombie genre, which has given all evidence it has started to run out of original ideas in the last few years, this hits in with a considerable originality. The story of teenagers who find a zombie girl and keep her imprisoned for sexual purposes soon enters a disturbing headspace