The film that I chose for today was inspired by a visit to my local theater last night. Last night I believe was the last chance you had to see the 50TH anniversary screening of Night Of The Living Dead and it was awesome. That is when I decided that I wanted to see a zombie film and I figured I would check out the fourth film in the Return Of The Living Dead series entitled Return Of The Living Dead: Necropolis which was released in 2005. When Zeke Borden (Elvin Dandel) goes down in a motorcross accident, his friends go searching for him, but the only problem is that he is not at an hospital, but at a research facility. When they go to rescue him, they unwillingly unleash the undead. The film also stars John Keefe (Here We Go) as Julian, Aimee Lynn Chadwick (Las Vegas) as Becky, Cory Hardrict (Battle Los Angeles) as Cody, Jana Kramer (Friday Night Lights) as Katie, Peter Coyote (The Legend Of Billie Jean) as Uncle Charles, Alexandru Geoana (Pumpkinhead: Blood Feud) as Jake, Diana Munteanu (Seed Of Chucky) as Mimi Romero, Toma Danila (The Devil Inside) as Carlos, Gelu Nitu (Icon) as Boris, Boris Petroff (The Prophecy: Uprising) as Crusty, and the film was directed by Ellory Elkayem (Eight Legged Freaks).
I only have one rule when heading into a zombie film and that is you do not change the science of how to kill a zombie. George Romero set the guidelines in 1968 that you either burned them to ash, disconnected the head from the body, or you hit him with a bullet to the brain or you stab the brain. That is how you kill a zombie and for the most part they followed it with some of them in the beginning of the film, but then they ignored it with just shooting them anywhere or snapping their necks like you’re in a kung fu movie. To top that, one of the zombies was fully conscious and he could kick your ass for the most part which while it was annoying, I got over it. They had everything from regular zombies to have borg (Star Trek) like zombies armed with heavy artillery which just made no sense to me, but it is a research facility so I’ll let that one slide. With the certain actors they had in this film, I was quite surprised at how cringe worthy their acting was especially from Peter Coyote who I thought was great in so many films. Cory Hardrict, I have seen in many films, but this was not one of those brilliant performances. Overall, the film was just a recipe for disaster and I was trying to figure out where in the hell in the world were they? This is definitely a film that you may want to think twice about and just enjoy the original three films in the series that were brilliant. I am going to give the film an D+ for a final grade.
For today’s entry to Eddie’s 31 Days Of Halloween, I was surprised that I hadn’t reviewed more Stephen King films more often than I have. So, today we decided to review a film that was always one of my favorite ones in Stephen King’s Maximum Overdrive, a film about a renegade comet that the Earth gets stuck in for eight days. Things start going out of whack on Earth like Lawnmowers running over people, a vending machine killing people with it’s soda cans, and tractor trailers driving on their own. For a group of workers and patrons at a truck stop, they don’t completely know what is going on when things start going haywire in Wilmington, North Carolina. For Bill Robinson (Emilio Estevez), a kid with a troubled past is just trying to get through life with his crappy job as a cook until he has to step up to be the hero when all of this craziness is going down. The film also stars Pat Hingle (Batman 1989) as Bubba Hendershot, Laura Harrington (What’s Eating Gilbert Grape) as Brett, Yeardly Smith (The Legend Of Billie Jean) as Connie, John Short (Ransom) as Curt, Holter Graham (Fly Away Home) as Deke, Frankie Faison (Silence Of The Lambs) as Handy, Christopher Murney (The Last Dragon) as Camp Loman, Ellen McElduff (JFK) as Wanda, J.C. Quinn (The Abyss) as Duncan, and the film was directed by Stephen King.
First off, you can never go wrong choosing a film to watch that has a soundtrack completely provided by AC/DC and secondly this was the 80’s which meant that a lot of great horror flicks were coming out. I always loved the idea of tractor trailers trying to kill humans. It’s almost like the Terminator where the machines that man built are getting back at the human race. Some of the scenes can be cheesy, but for the most part this film was awesome. The fact that they had a road roller run over and flatten a kid at the little league field was ballsy in my opinion because you never really saw that in too many films. The kill scenes for the most part were actually really good and the combo of Laura Harrington and Emilio Estevez was a good decision, but they move a little too fast in the film. What I mean by that is the idea that they meet and she’s instantly his. Maybe, it’s because Emilio was a boss back in the day. I think Stephen King did a really good job directing the film and like a lot of other horror greats, he inserts himself in one little scene in the beginning of the movie when he tries to use the ATM. Definitely check out this little treasure from Stephen King as I give the film an B+ for a final grade.
Moshpits And Movies 