A Rundown of the 13 Best Horror Movies I've Seen in the Past Year
[4 of 13]
The Zombie Apocalypse Slot

SEOUL-YEOK

(SEOUL STATION)
(April 2016)

Yeon Sang-ho's animated prequel to Busanhaeng (Train to Busan) actually plays better than its live-action sequel, and that’s probably all down to the fact that it’s a more atypical zombie cinema viewing experience than Busanhaeng.

Why is that, you may ask?

To wit:

A: Animated zombies are far more uncommon than live-action ones.

B: Unlike Busanhaeng, we don’t really see your usual zombie cinema character types here.

C: The social commentary is far more satisfactorily evident, with some barbed rants against country and government. And the class divide is likewise more overt here.

It should be noted though that there are some rather cruel and vicious moments in this one, some moments having nothing at all to do with the zombies…

If that all still sounds like your cup of (zombie) tea, then take heed: ¡Qué horror! strongly approves Seoul-yeok!

THE GIRL WITH ALL THE GIFTS

(August 2016)

Now here's a zombie film that very consciously takes some relatively unfamiliar routes in its narrative, and that kind of zombie film is definitely worthy of some ¡Qué horror! love.

Mike Carey--yes, that Mike Carey--adapts his own novel, The Girl with All the Gifts, and helps (heh) gift us with a title that should settle in nicely in the annals of zombie cinema.

Now, in lieu of getting all spoiler-y, let’s take a look at some of the film’s other personnel:

Director Colm McCarthy first landed in ¡Qué horror! territory in the 2011 rundown, with his feature debut, Outcast. Now he’s back with his sophomore feature.

(He’s apparently been keeping busy on the telly front. And speaking of, he’s set to direct the Krypton Pilot for SyFy--yes, that Krypton--so that should be something!)

Composer Cristobal Tapia de Veer, who positively killed on the score for the late and very much lamented Utopia, slays once again here.

(He also worked on the first series of Humans, though sadly, he didn’t score the second.)

And that cast!

Not only do we have Paddy Considine and Gemma Arterton, we’ve also got Glenn Close!

Glenn! Close!

And the feature debut of Sennia Nanua isn’t too shabby neither!

So, if you feel like supporting atypical zombie fare (and you really really should!), then by all means, pay The Girl with All the Gifts a visit!

Parting Shot:

While Carey is possibly better known in the comics world for his work on Lucifer or Hellblazer, as far as I’m concerned, his magnum opus in graphic literature is definitely The Unwritten.

(Seoul Station UK quad courtesy of impawards.com & The Girl with All the Gifts UK quad courtesy of bloody-disgusting.com; novel blurb OS courtesy of orbitbooks.net.)

SANTA CLARITA DIET
(January 2017)

"... On the other hand, maybe nothin’s impossible. Who would have ever thought an octopus and a kitten could fall in love?
"It’s on YouTube. You gotta see it. It’ll give you hope.”

There’s a select group of actors who, because of a Single Fantabulous Film (or TV Show) that they helped shepherd into reality, have got a lifetime Pass from me; they can choose to come out in whatever kind of film or series they want, and I will have no right to look at them askance or criticize them, because I’m eternally grateful for that Single Fantabulous Film (or TV Show).

Nicolas Cage immediately comes to mind. Because he produced E. Elias Merhige’s Shadow of the Vampire, I can forgive him for a lot, even (gulp) The Wicker Man remake.

There’s also Drew Barrymore, who now has two lifetime Passes from me: the first, for Donnie Darko (executive producer), and the second, for Santa Clarita Diet (again, executive producer). And she backed both up with her star power by appearing in the cast.

Thanx, Gertie!

“No. Don’t do anything, okay? Just relax.

“I’m dead. It can wait until tomorrow.”

Barrymore and co-star (and co-executive producer) Timothy Olyphant are husband and wife realtors, Sheila and Joel Hammond, doing their best to cope with Sheila’s new titular diet, which is (gasp!) human flesh.

Seriously, I haven’t had this much fun with anything zombie since Shaun of the Dead.

Which is why I’m talking about it here, outside of the ¡Qué horror! rundown, since this isn’t really a horror show, so much as it is a comedy with some horror elements.

“Maybe we should just keep driving. Go home, get some clothes, and just never come back.”

“Well, that’s crazy! We can’t just run away. Where would we go?! Oh, we have so much equity in our house!”

“Ah! I didn’t think about the equity! I’m a monster.”

The beauty of the show though is, as much as it’s about the hijinx that result from Sheila’s zombiefication, it’s just as much about the way a family deals with seismic upheavals, about finding family wherever you can, and embracing the reality that, even if something’s changed, that doesn’t mean it can’t be beautiful.

And not only do we have Barrymore as the newly confident and energetic Sheila, and Olyphant as the weed-smoking, occasionally manic Joel, but there’s an excellent supporting cast here too, starting with Liv Hewson (as their headstrong daughter Abby) and Skyler Gisondo (as lovable creeper next door, Eric), and stretching out to the two cops who live on either side of the Hammonds (uh-oh), Richard T. Jones and Ricardo Chavira (who also happens to be the jerkface stepfather to the aforementioned lovable creeper Eric).

Oh! And a 2-episode appearance by Grace Zabriskie! So awesome, ‘cause we all know there is No Such Thing As Too Much Grace Zabriskie!

And for another dose of awesome, Portia de Rossi shows up at the tail end of the season (in a role that was apparently written specifically for her).

“Hello.”

“I’m sorry. I’m not in the mood.”

“Just saying ‘Hello.’”

“I know your ‘Hello’s, honey, and that one was pouring me a glass of wine.”

If you’ve frequented the Iguana in the past, you’ll know that we’re pretty big here on atypical titles of bone-tired genres, and most everything zombie these days is so SO tired. So I wasn’t going to pass up the chance of trumpeting Santa Clarita Diet just because it wasn’t full-on horror. (Here’s hoping Netflix renews it for a second season.)

I dubbed I Am a Hero “the perfect antidote for those all-too-relentlessly grim soap opera zombie titles.”

I was wrong.

Santa Clarita Diet is the perfect antidote for those all-too-relentlessly grim soap opera zombie titles.

Boom.

“I really don’t think I bit him.”

“But what if you did? And what if that makes him turn, and then he bites someone, and they bite someone and pretty soon, we’re like the biggest a$$holes ever!”

(Santa Clarita Diet OS’ courtesy of bloody-disgusting.com & impawards.com.)

¡QUÉ HORROR! 2017

Candidate #9

I AM A HERO

(October 2015)

And here's another zombie film that takes an interesting and atypical approach to its narrative.

Based on the manga by Hanazawa Kengo, Sato Shinsuke’s I Am a Hero follows struggling mangaka’s assistant Hideo (Ôizumi Yô), still waiting for his big break, much to the increasing annoyance of his girlfriend, Tekko (Katase Nana).

Will our, ahem, hero finally get his own work published and serialized, and get the girl?

Then again, it probably doesn’t matter, ‘cause, you know… zombie apocalypse.

As we well know, zombie apocalypses tend to muck up the small, trivial things the human race has usually got going on, things like plans and life…

There are dollops of thrills and black comedy and pathos here amidst the gore and the grue--and there’s a whole lotta that, so be warned--as well as a tip of the zombie hat to Romero’s Dawn of the Dead.

I Am a Hero is the perfect antidote for those all-too-relentlessly grim soap opera zombie titles out there…

(I Am a Hero OS courtesy of wwwatch.in.)

¡QUÉ HORROR! 2017

Candidate #6

BUSANHAENG
(TRAIN TO BUSAN)

(May 2016)

I'll say it right up front: if you watch a lot of zombie cinema, then you’ve seen this movie before.

Yes, they’re speaking in Korean, and sure, we’re on a speeding train, but you’ve got the Sudden Outbreak, the Initially Unlikely Hero, the Somewhat Obnoxious Guy Who May or May Not Prove to Be Heroic After All, the Characters Who Will Need Extra Protection (in this case, we have a Child and an Expectant Mother), and yes, of course we have the A$$hole.

And believe you me, the specimen we have here, played by Kim Eui-sung is like, Lord Emperor A$$hole.

Despite the familiarity of the character types and the beats though--there are a number of Sacrifices here, both of the Voluntary, and definitely Not Voluntary type, as well as Moments of Pathos, where the music swells and we’re moved to reach for a box of tissues--it cannot be denied that Yeon Sang-ho’s Busanhaeng is an effective entry in zombie cinema, and as such, worthy of some ¡Qué horror! love.

(Unless of course, you’re a Slow Zombie loyalist, in which case, do not apply; Busanhaeng sports adrenalized, occasionally contortionist zombies.)

Thus, given where the film positions itself on the narrative spectrum, there is also no significant Romero sociopolitical subtext here, the biggest takeaway perhaps being this tried and tested law in zombie cinema: no matter how bad things get, there’s always going to be an a$$hole who’ll make things even worse…

(Busanhaeng quad courtesy of twitter.com.)

¡Qué horror! 2014

Sidebar (1)

We're half a month out from this year’s cut-off date, and so I thought I needed to take note of a couple of TV shows that don’t really register as “horror,”* but were nonetheless among the absolute best the past 12 months had to offer.

IN THE FLESH

Series 2

This excellent show also got a mention for its first series ‘round these parts, and in a lot of ways, its second super-sized go-around is even better**. It takes the whole zombie thing and sets up a narrative that makes a much more optimal use of its scenario, operating on the level of allegory and socio-political commentary while telling us a tale of just how human any of us (living or otherwise) can be in the face of massive cultural upheaval.

George Romero should be proud.

As I said before, this is the show for those of you out there who are looking for more from their television zombies. It’s the show that achieves disquiet and unease without having to resort to fake bloodletting and over-the-top gore.

* Or, at least not in the same way as this year’s television Candidates qualify as “horror.”

** Well, maybe except for the fact that we see significantly less of Dr. Channard himself, Kenneth Cranham, than we did in series 1…

THE LEFTOVERS

Season 1

In the Sunday night face-off between ex-Lost showrunners Damon Lindelof and Carlton Cuse, Lindelof wins hands down, The Leftovers creaming The Strain without even breaking a sweat.

Based on the novel by Tom Perrotta (who also wrote Election and Little Children, both adapted into feature films), The Leftovers chronicles the state of the world following the sudden disappearance of 2% of the world’s population.

It’s a somber, weighty, and emotionally wrenching watch, this, and clearly not for everyone.

But I love this show, and I must give props to Lindelof, Perrotta, and Peter Berg (who directed the pilot), for having the balls to give us a show like this. It’s the kind of show that we need, lest the television landscape be reduced to a sea of sitcoms and procedurals and “procedurals with a twist” and CSI’s and CSI clones and CSI clones’ spin-offs, and reality TV shows.

It’s the kind of show that, just as all serious art must do, makes us question and ponder, makes us take a brief step back from the 25/8 madness of the contemporary world and consider existence in all its beautiful and tragic and brutal glory.

(In The Flesh image courtesy of bbcamerica.com; In The Flesh DVD cover art courtesy of twitter.com; The Leftovers OS’ courtesy of impawards.com.)

A Rundown of the 13 (+1) Best Horror Movies I've Seen in the Past Year

[11 of 13]

Yes, I'm perfectly aware that the tie in this year's rundown is held by two television shows, but the fact is, there's a lot of really excellent TV going on, and some of it happens to fall into the genre that we celebrate at the Iguana every Halloween, so, just think of these as extra-long movies if you must, so long as you give them a look.
And so, without further ado...

LES REVENANTS

(THE RETURNED)
(November 2012)

I mentioned Robin Campillo’s Les Revenants (They Came Back) ‘round these parts before in passing.

Allow me now to expound on that film further…

Unleashed in 2004--about a year and a half after Danny Boyle and Alex Garland gave us 28 Days Later, and just two months after A) Zack Snyder managed to get the brilliant Sarah Polley in a zombie movie and inadvertently ignited the slow vs. fast zombie debate with his impressive debut, the Dawn of the Dead remake, and B) Edgar Wright, Simon Pegg, and Nick Frost kicked off their Three Flavours Cornetto Trilogy with Shaun of the Dead--Campillo’s Les Revenants emerged in the very early days of what would eventually develop into an unlikely revival of zombie cinema.

Even back then, Les Revenants felt, at least to me, like a breath of fresh air, a radically different approach to the idea of the dead returning to walk the earth.

Here, in a narrative co-written by Campillo with Brigitte Tijou, there were no rotting, shambling corpses intent on ripping into warm human flesh. Instead, there were the recently deceased (within the past decade), who suddenly appear, whole and seemingly unharmed, wanting only to return to the lives they’d been rudely evicted from by their deaths.

Here, Campillo focused on the living as well, those left behind, who now have to suddenly adjust to the reality that what they might have prayed for--the return of their departed loved ones--had, quite unbelievably, come to pass.

Flash forward to November of last year, and in the eight and a half years since Les Revenants, zombies had moved into the mainstream and become the monster du jour of horror, with an American zombie cable television show perennially breaking ratings records with seeming impunity.

Zombie, you’ve come a long way, baby…

It’s into this strange new world that Canal+’s television adaptation of Les Revenants emerges, and once again, we’re given an atypical depiction of the zombie phenomenon, one needed now more than ever, with so many bland and derivative entries in zombie cinema littering the sidewalks and the cineplexes.

Expanded into an eight-episode first season (with a second season that’s expected to debut early next year), the TV version of Les Revenants employs the same subtle creep and dread of Campillo’s original, eschewing a portion of the art house ambiguity of the film for some more traditional drama of the serialized sort, as well as some more overtly supernatural goings-on (though the exact nature of those aren’t really explained either).

And though the TV show’s narrative does not really follow the film’s (save for the central conceit of the dead returning and how that event impacts on the living), there is one major cast member carry-over: Frédéric Pierrot, playing different characters in either iteration, of course.   

The last time I put a TV series into the ¡Qué horror! milieu was Dead Set. But just as that show rightly deserved its ¡Qué horror! spot, so does this one. (Just imagine you’re watching an 8-hour long movie, with a sequel waiting in the wings…)

Plus, Mogwai scored the damned thing, so hey, one more reason to check it out!

Parting Shot 1: It should be noted that AbbottVision and FremantleMedia Enterprises have purchased the English-language remake rights, and intend to produce a show under the title, They Came Back, so I’d advise you to hunt down the French original before then.

This show should not be confused with ABC’s mid-season title, Resurrection, which is based on the novel, The Returned, by Jason Mott. (Though honestly, Mott’s novel, to be released in August, has a central conceit that’s pretty much the one in Campillo’s original. As Publisher’s Weekly puts it, “A family gets caught up in a worldwide event in which loved ones return from the dead exactly as they last were in life.” Hurm.)

Parting Shot 2: Also, if the atypical zombie’s your thing, then you should check out the 3 episode BBC show In The Flesh, which might have gotten this ¡Qué horror! slot, but it’s particularly less “horror” than Les Revenants, so…

Still, it’s worth your while, if you want more from your zombies than AMC’s The Walking Dead can give you…

(Les Revenants OS' courtesy of impawards.com; They Came Back DVD cover art courtesy of amazon.com; Les Revenants OST sleeve art courtesy of amazon.co.uk.)

HANNIBAL

(April 2013)

For the record, I love Bryan Fuller’s TV work (though the Mockingbird Lane pilot did leave me wanting), and the show of his I really, truly, and completely loved was Wonderfalls.

So the fact that Caroline Dhavernas is part of the cast of Fuller’s adaptation of Hannibal is all sorts of awesome.

Of course, that’s not the reason why Hannibal has tied with Les Revenants for a ¡Qué horror! slot this year; Dhavernas is many things, but a “horror” she most certainly is not.

Hannibal is here because this is a solid adaptation of Thomas Harris’ serial killer novels featuring Hannibal “The Cannibal” Lecter.

Ostensibly, Red Dragon is the main source material for the show, a novel which has already been adapted to film twice, in 1986 by Michael Mann under the title Manhunter, and in 2002, by Brett Ratner.

According to Fuller’s roadmap of the show though, Hannibal Season 4 would be the adaptation proper of Red Dragon, while, if the stars align, we may actually see a television adaptation of The Silence of the Lambs,* envisioned as Season 5 of the show, should we get that far.

And if the level of creative quality remains constant (or hopefully, actually increases), then that’s a future I’d very much like to see. 

In Season 1 alone, we’ve got some heavy directorial hitters like David Slade (whose excellent Awake Pilot was one of last season’s TV highlights), Michael Rymer (who solidified his geek cred with his work on Ron Moore’s Battlestar Galactica), and 75-year-old Peter Medak (who scarred many an audience member with the chilling quiet horror of 1980’s The Changeling).

Then there’s Guillermo Navarro, frequent cinematographer for Guillermo del Toro (including the 2 hours and 11 minutes of awesome kaiju madness that is Pacific Rim), who won a whole slew of awards--including the Oscar--for his work on El Laberinto del Fauno. Navarro had previously worked with Fuller as DP on the Mockingbird Lane pilot, and here, he directs a trio of episodes (as do both Slade and Rymer, taking a lion’s share of the season between the three of them).

Some Twin Peaks episode helmers are also in here: James Foley (who also brought us the big screen adaptation of Glengarry Glen Ross) and Tim Hunter (no, not the Books of Magic kid).

All that livewire creativity and talent behind the camera, and we haven’t even gotten to the excellent cast.

The cold, clinical detachment Mads Mikkelsen brings to his Hannibal is a fine offset to the twitchy, tortured nature of Hugh Dancy’s Will Graham. And, you know, Mikkelsen had to walk in the intimidating footsteps of both Brian Cox and Sir Anthony Hopkins.

Plus, there are those guest star turns:

Gillian Anderson, who enters at the midpoint of the season, under the beautifully unlikely name of Dr. Bedelia Du Maurier;

Fellow Chris Carter alumnus, Lance Henriksen;

And other past Fuller collaborators: Raúl Esparza, Eddie Izzard, Ellen Greene, and Ellen Muth (but that was a pretty evil way to wrap up her guest starring stint, Mr. Fuller, an evil way…).

So with both Dhavernas and Muth having made their appearances, all we need are either Lee Pace or Anna Friel (or both) to enter Hannibal’s world, and we’ll complete the Past Fuller Leads Trifecta.

Hurrah!

In a world where TV procedurals have reached well beyond saturation point, one of the things that saves Hannibal from the potential pitfall of becoming just another one of those “serial killer of the week” shows is the serialized nature of its narrative.

Coming into the show with a general idea of the overarching narrative (from the Harris novels and the previous film adaptations of the material), the audience is hooked. They want to see how the cards fall, they can’t wait for the other shoe to drop, for Graham and company to discover exactly what kind of a monster Lecter really is.

It’s the same approach to story that was successfully utilized in Smallville (at least, for the first few seasons), and more recently, in Bates Motel.
We all know Clark Kent eventually becomes Superman, we all know Norman Bates eventually kills his mother and a whole string of unfortunate motel guests, we all know Hannibal Lecter eventually ends up in the loonybin where he gets to play cat and mouse with Clarice Starling.
Part of the fun lies in watching how we get there.

And thus far, this is some morbid, gruesome “fun.” (Network television is getting away with a lot these days…)

If I could ask for something though, I’d ask for a bit more psychopathology; the show doesn’t really bother to explain the whys of their killers. We meet them fully (mal)formed, without any significant idea of how these sick puppies got so ill, without knowing the twisted road they walked to get here.

It’s almost as if Fuller and company are saying, serial killers really are inexplicable.

It’s almost like they’re saying, there is no “Why.” Serial killers simply are.

And that’s a truly horrifying thought…

* A possibility that both intrigues me (because there were some bits of the novel that were dropped in Jonathan Demme’s adaptation; among them, Jack Crawford’s turmoil, the seeds of which, have already been planted by Fuller and company in Season 1) and terrifies me (because The Silence of the Lambs is one of those brilliant lightning in a bottle moments in cinema, where everything seemed to align exquisitely).

Again, for the record, Demme’s Silence is, thus far, the only Harris film adaptation that I’ve been completely floored by. All the others--from Mann’s Manhunter, through until Peter Webber’s Hannibal Rising--haven’t come even close.

Here’s hoping Fuller’s Hannibal can ultimately succeed where all those others failed…

(Hannibal OS’ courtesy of impawards.com.)

DEADGIRL
(Review)

Rickie (Shiloh Fernandez) and JT (Brick’s Noah Segan) are two high school misfits who’ve been friends since forever, and now, they’ve just discovered something in the bowels of an abandoned mental hospital, something that will deform not just their relationship, but their psyches as well.


Deadgirl is a disquietingly impressive feature from co-directors Marcel Sarmiento and Gadi Harel, working off a script written by Trent Haaga.
Haaga expertly takes a horror staple,* placing it firmly in a high school milieu we’ve hardly seen it in before (and certainly never dealt with in so serious a manner), a disturbing narrative that touches on, among other things, the cruel societal hierarchies in high school, the objectification of the female form, and the fantasies that buoy us through the seas of alienated adolescence.
Deadgirl also manages to examine friendships built on the foundations of circumstance and reinforced by their surroundings, and how extenuating factors can impact on those relationships.
The two main leads, Fernandez and Segan, are a large part of why Deadgirl works as well as it does. Though neither portrays a completely sympathetic character, they both nonetheless deliver terribly effective performances, finding the humanity at the core of their characters, even when they’re committing repulsive, heinous acts.


This is very strong stuff, horror not to be taken lightly, and that doesn’t treat its audience with kid gloves.
This may be about high school kids, but Deadgirl isn’t one of those PG-13 Hollywood horror films featuring some teen-ish TV stars on hiatus.
It doesn’t mess about, and rather single-mindedly, goes straight for the gut, and, in a very welcome surprise, also goes for the heart. For anyone who’s survived the psychic minefield of high school, there are some rather familiar feelings on display here, amidst all the blood and gore.


Another interesting characteristic of Deadgirl is that it implicitly acknowledges that all those huge, widescreen horror epics can find their roots in the smallest of stories, in the narrow divide between friendship and love.
It’s certainly a great gift to horror cinema from Haaga, Sarmiento, and Harel, that they chose to tell that small story (fittingly enough, about very big things), a tale of desperation and desire, of resentment and revenge, of life and death, and the yawning abyss that separates the two.


“[Deadgirl is] an important movie for me, because it examines how horrific being a teenager can be. Were you a f*cked up kid? Did you wish chicks dug you? Did you wish that just once you had control, a little right to something, the right to be the boss? Deadgirl put me in the position to answer those questions I've been asking since I was 13. These are real feelings in a surreal world and it helped me a lot, as terrifying as it was to dig down and bring up all that horrific truth and vitriol. I hope people see the movie as a metaphor and not just a horror movie.” -- Noah Segan


* Or what could very well be one (in fact, a particularly popular staple at the moment); we’re never told exactly what it is during the running time, though we can guess, given the evidence at hand…

(Deadgirl OS’s courtesy of bloody-disgusting.com; images courtesy of shocktillyoudrop.com & deadgirlmovie.blogspot.com.)

DØD SNØ
(DEAD SNOW)
(Review)


Norwegian director Tommy Wirkola kicks off Død snø (Dead Snow) to Grieg’s “In the Hall of the Mountain King,” and this rousing (yet vaguely sinister) tune ushers us—without much ado—into this fun Nazi zombie romp.
Yes, you read that right.
Nazi zombie.
How cool is that?!


A bunch of med students are off in the snow-capped mountains for Easter vacation, and, well, they run into those pesky Nazi zombies, and much screaming, and bloodshed, and running around (yes, these are post-28 Days Later deadheads) ensue.
Now, despite that smirk-guaranteed premise (Nazi. Zombie.), Død snø isn’t a horror-comedy on the order of Shaun of the Dead, but rather a horror film that straddles two sub-genres (the zombie romp and the isolated-cabin-in-the-wilderness thriller), with some comedic touches thrown in for good measure.
Think a more sedate version of a latter day Evil Dead installment, when the humour was quickly encroaching on the material. To be clear, there aren’t any Three Stooges or dismembered-hand-giving-the-hero-the-finger moments in Død snø (I did say “more sedate”). But there are some laughs and over-the-top insanity amidst the shouty, gory bits.


In point of fact, early on in Død snø, the horror film milieu is acknowledged, with Evil Dead actually mentioned, a cheeky swipe all in line with Død snø’s sense of fun within a horror movie context; it’s also a sentiment I happen to agree with, a feeling that’s been with me ever since I was vaguely disappointed after seeing Evil Dead 2 for the first time.
Of course, what Evil Dead 2 and Død snø share is that both are rather fun experiences at the cinema. That common trait notwithstanding, Død snø does have its shortcomings, among them, the vaguely insubstantial back story to the wild goings-on. (And yes, Evil Dead did have a very basic back story as well, but somehow, the rest of the audacious proceedings more than made up for its rather elementary nature.)


Still, Død snø does have its moments, and has piqued my interest, not just in a proposed sequel (here’s hoping Wirkola hits it spot on a second time out), but also the reported Hansel and Gretel: Witch Hunters, in which we find the titular siblings all grown up and having turned their childhood trauma into their livelihood. (In this case, I’m hoping Wirkola can get right what Terry Gilliam fumbled in The Brothers Grimm.)


(Død snø OS courtesy of twitchfilm.net; images courtesy of twitchfilm.net, empireonline.com, & shocktillyoudrop.com; Dead Snow OS courtesy of rushprint.no.)

DEAD SET

(Review)

“I suppose most TV is a distraction from something or another. That's kind of a theme in the show, we're kind of distracted by a lot of entertainment in this day and age, and obviously in vaguely making that point, what I've really done is create a zombie-romp that will further distract people from whatever might be more important in their lives. I've basically made the problem worse.”

-- Charlie Brooker

“I mean, you know, what is TV anyway? It’s just a big fat arrow pointing away from the problem. Especially shows like this.”

-- Joplin

So the zombie television outbreak may have been blocked on American shores with the Babylon Fields pilot not getting picked up to series, but across the Atlantic, the ravenous undead hordes have besieged the small screen via the gripping Dead Set.

It’s Day 64, 2:36pm, at the Big Brother house.

It’s an Eviction Night and the studio’s going just a bit madder than it usually is.

And wouldn’t you know it, but what initially seems to be rioting and random acts of violence--news coverage of which threatens to preempt the show, much to the annoyance of producer Patrick Goad--turns out to be a full-fledged zombie plague.

Featuring the recently discovered genus of the running zombie--first seen in Zack Snyder’s Dawn of the Dead redux, whose deadheads in turn took a cue from the Rage-infected of Danny Boyle’s 28 Days Later--and employing a handheld camera aesthetic courtesy of DP Tat Radcliffe, Dead Set is the unholy marriage of two media trends that have, for the most part, outstayed their welcome on the pop culture landscape: reality television and the zombie movie.

What at first sounds like a gimmicky conceit though--what happens to the isolated and insulated Big Brother housemates should a zombie outbreak occur?--turns out to be a particularly vicious and feral specimen in the still alarmingly burgeoning ranks of zombie cinema.

For that, we have to thank comic writer Charlie Brooker and director Yann Demange, for not shying away from giving us all the oozy, gory bits any self-respecting zombie movie should have.

Also upping the tension is the skillful slicing of editor Chris Wyatt, who takes Radcliffe’s shots and employs the frenetic cutting employed by Chris Gill in 28 Days Later and its sequel, to excellent effect.

(Demange, Radcliffe, and Wyatt had all previously worked together on Secret Diary of a Callgirl.)

There’s also an effective cast here, which includes Jaime Winstone, daughter of Ray, who’s also seen in Olly Blackburn’s Donkey Punch, Muay Thai champ-turned-actor Warren Brown, and Adam Deacon (who’d previously worked with Winstone on Menhaj Huda’s Kidulthood).

But the truly unforgettable one onscreen is undoubtedly Andy Nyman, who was the annoyingly endearing Gordon in Christopher Smith’s Severance, and who plays “hard-nosed, ambitious and shouty” Patrick.

If nothing else, Patrick will go down as the most excruciatingly irritating character ever to grace a zombie movie. (You know the one; the character you just can’t wait to get chomped on, the one whose death scene you’ll be cheering wildly.)

Ultimately, Dead Set is an absorbing (and quite welcome) entry amongst the more recent zombie romps, which makes a number of nods to Romero’s original Dead trilogy, from lines, to a climactic death scene (blood and guts galore!).

And not only does it pump up the grue quotient to ridiculous heights, it also takes a bloody swipe at the inanity of reality television and those who choose to partake in it, with former Big Brother housemates and presenter Davina McCall along for the ride.

It’s a thrilling and gory look at the collision of catastrophe and entertainment, where the idea of reality television as goldfish bowl is taken to its bleakest extreme.

There’s also a nasty bit of fire extinguisher work reminiscent of Gaspar Noe’s Irreversible, so what’s not to like, really?

“I’m not even saying there is a God. But if there is, maybe all this is happening because He… or She… or It… is judging our culture, and spiting us accordingly.”

“Yeah, but why be such a c*nt about it?”

(Originally aired on E4 October last year, all 5 episodes of Dead Set are available on DVD.)

Parting shot: Incidentally, Chris Wyatt also edited Peter Greenaway’s The Pillow Book, Shane Meadows’ This Is England, and E. Elias Merhige’s Shadow of the Vampire.

Additionally, reviews of Severance, as well as a whole host of zombie films, may be found in the Iguana Archive.

(Dead Set DVD cover art courtesy of dvdactive.com; images courtesy of e4.com.)