Deep Freeze

A loving family says farewell to its honoured grandpa one sad day, who had spent his life in traditional service to that same unit et au travail.

Hoping to one day meet again, they hire a new service to preserve his body, in new age cryogenic slumber until such a time as he can be reanimated. 

Things go well at the farsighted business as hundreds of wealthy people eagerly seek, newfound life in another epoch on down the road with their illness cured.

Family life returns to normal the humble father still working at the library, the mother making ends meritoriously meet, as a Grade 5 teacher, the children getting along.

Just as a brilliant yet mad disciplined scientist sets out to create an undead army, of somnambulistic unfrozen supermen steadfast and loyal to his every word.

He's developed a universal preservative which athletically reanimates frozen tissue, while making it susceptible to suggestion such as let's rule the entire world.

Working as a modest janitor he infiltrates the cryogenic facility, and continuously waits with diligent patience for the right moment to create his army.

As luck would have it, one carefree evening his fellow workers sit down to play, a heated game of Texas Hold 'Em with humble stakes and heartfelt empathy.

He makes sure to go all in early on so he'll get knocked out.

The slumbering automatons unconsciously awaiting.

His insane authoritative commands. 

*What would you do if you had your own army of reanimated Übermensch, son?

**First, I'd see if they could play hockey. Then, if they were athletically gifted, I'd make my own team and compete in the playoffs.

*What if they weren't that athletic?

**I might establish my own business. If they were skilled negotiators, we could make some serious money.

*Do you think harnessing the power of the undead would give you an unfair commercial advantage?

**Are you being facetious?

*Not intentionally. I suppose it's taken for granted that you wouldn't try to conquer the known universe?

**Why would I? It's already been done in the film!

*Crazy family reunion I'd say.

**That was an awkward Thanksgiving. 

We are Zombies

That would be odd if everyone who had ever lived continued to exist until the end of time, spatial limitations and moribund immortality disproportionately confounding spiritual orthodoxies. 

Build up I say, like in Asia, unless you want one massive sprawling country, covering integral forests nationswide, with no room for resilient animals.

Has there ever been an animal zombie film within which not only humans nexercise livid purgatory, and everywhere you go every living thing that has ever existed regenerates evermore?

It could be related to a celestial deficit where living beings of all kinds are denied an afterlife, the gods furious or dismissive or bored and consequently no longer interested in accepting newcomers.

It could correspond to a disastrous future where ubiquitous pollution has destroyed the environment, while populations both living and dead continue to expand ad infinitum (there's an episode of Star Trek for that! [the expanding population not the pollution {Original Series}]). 

It wouldn't have to be on this planet it could be discovered by adventurers in space, who happen to be carrying a spiritual adviser with them who could slowly detect the absent celesticity.

In the end they could locate extant clerics still in possession of the ancient codes. 

To once again open the doors of Valhalla. 

And gleefully repopulate ethereal equivalencies. 

Condos etc. do seem like the way to go although they may not fit with many cultural narratives, wherein which vast estates and boundless lands occupy definitive prominent theatre.

Whatevs, apartments can fit so many more people and offer multiple stunning wide-ranging views, you can build up and up and up to reach haughty-high-heaven if you really want to.

It must be strange within however waiting for the elevator at times may be frustrating, and if they shut down for a long period of time that could be borderline life-threatening for older residents.

I suppose they would be so gigantic that they would be like small towns of their own, and develop unique genuine multiplicities generally attuned to elaborate social structures.

You could even incorporate dance halls with first rate acoustics and a lively theatre, thus creating self-sustaining enclaves with schools and shopping malls and medical centres.

Planet Zombie still a long ways off note the value of birth control and family planning.

We are Zombies isn't as cataclysmic as some.

But still showcases some classic carnage.

Disturbingly decadent!  

Zombieland: Double Tap

Zombies continue to terrify the living and have even grimly mutated in the ravenous Double Tap.

Rules and regulations still provide psychoshelter as predictable routines and collegial cheer augment feisty brainiac exhilarations.

The new zombies fall into 4 categories, none more deadly than the T-800, who can dodge bullets and employ martial arts, with more ferocity than the agile ninja.

While hunting insatiably en masse.

Or scouring the land strict and solo.

Zombieland's heroes have resiliently returned to face the undead once more, but youth has blossomed with age, and seeks less old school jejune internships.

And after argumentatively co-existing for combative years on end, group members set out in search of riled alternatives.

Like bears opposed to sleuthing.

Uplifting independence, unpasteurized brays.

If you've forgotten what took place in the original, fret not, for you will be reminded, about so much of what transpired in fact, exceeding recourse to novel genealogy.

And somehow, even though the internet has lost its edge, and most of the planet has been infected, news still travels remarkably fast, and stats still motivate restless recollections.

Without maps or GPS peeps travel instinctively far and wide, always aware of where they're going, often sticking to backwoods paths.

The next generation has yet to materialize but good relations remain free from censure, and even conjugally express their bold rewards, extant shenanigans of a secular age.

Non-perishables uphold and sustain commercial values, and nothing seems to have run out after all this perilous time.

Platonically speaking, healthy appetite flourishes unrestrained, the loyal spirit still courageously defending a laid-back immured intelligentsia.

Who peacefully refrain.

With warm impassioned jouissance.

There are some new developments and I won't deny that it's fun to watch, but Zombieland 2 still relies too heavily on source material, and makes way less sense so many years later.

I suppose a zombie horror-comedy sequel doesn't have to abound with plausibility.

But its focus on rules still rationally suggests otherwise.

A bit too much spirit.

Not enough strategy.

Effervescent clandestine innocence.

Free to fluster, exile, array.

The Dead Don't Die

The traditional zombie film finds itself lackadaisically reanimated, as the ravenous undead seek out mortal sustenance, with organic flavouring, in Jim Jarmusch's The Dead Don't Die.

Much less lively than Zombieland or Planet Terror, it cultivates bewildered slow motion, without letting loose moribund haze, or struggling to refine grassroots bemusement.

It's funny.

It's aware of its chillaxed impersonal lounging, the ways in which it would rather present laidback ingenuous cheek than novel paramedic frenzy, and consistently dispassionately suggests that it could have offered more if it had only simply bothered to do so.

Efficiently.

Thus its form harmoniously complements its genre, its dislocated frostbitten content, a zombie film conjuring primordial zombie, like a tasty craft brew considering mass production.

There's no doubt it emits rebellious angst and bedridden drool, like mad productive insomnia regenerating meaningless gumption, as if it sculpted what it means to turn 40, while leaving out cursive progress and ambition.

While viewing I asked myself if the film would still be cool without the star-studded cast, if it would have still lured me in with decadent charm had it been stacked with unknowns.

There are several unknown actors in the film who add curious depth and unsung integrity, but several big names still intermingle, and seem somewhat out of place in hindsight even if they revel in agile somnambulism.

I think it would have succeeded either way.

It likely would have been stronger without the stars in fact, inasmuch as determined unknowns often make nimble impacts in the genres.

The world has been tipped off its axis after fracking in the arctic disrupts polar reckoning.

And as the sun no longer sets with reliability, governments insist there's no cause for alarm.

Shortly thereafter, the undead descend on unsuspecting towns, arising on different days, to illustrate cannibalistic bedlam.

Had alternative energy sources been globally adopted, and cuts to education vilified with legislative resolve, the world would have likely embraced a much less disturbing future, as if working toward planetary goals was expressly paramount.

What will hopefully seem like absurd cool creative storytelling one day doesn't even seem far fetched at the moment.

Isn't it actually easier and less costly to start transitioning to a greener economy than it is to frack the arctic?

Doesn't going green make more sense than that?

You know it does.

And don't tell me there aren't huge profits to be made.

If it costs more to buy a burger made from plants than it does to buy one made from animals that you have to feed and take care of, there are obviously huge profits in green.

Versatile verdure.

Biodiverse trestle.

The Rift: Dark Side of the Moon

North of Belgrade, a mysterious satellite crash leads an eclectic international mismatch to cautiously exhibit.

Their leader, ill at ease with working with others and known for adopting unorthodox methods, blindly yet confidently leads onwards.

A brilliant scientist, tenacious tesla, and liaising liability accompany him forthwith, illustrious classified governmental nocturnes somnambulistically elucidating their scratchy lunar distillates.

After encountering a haunting spaceperson, whose inexplicable presence seems to be immortally manipulating its surroundings, madness slowly hemorrhages their improvised intentions.

Correspondingly, a secret portal holds enigmatic clues to his or her terrestrial origins, its temporal spatial eccentricities, seductively eviscerating psychological bounds.

As well.

Is the world at large a component of an invisible computer program (requiring caring environmental stewardship) within which those designated prophetic in ages past had accidentally downloaded information regarding the future through the ether which made no sense within their contemporary sociocultural predicaments?

I'm not sure.

Even if it's true, nevertheless, it couldn't save The Rift: Dark Side of the Moon from taking itself too seriously.

I imagine it was written by someone whose first language isn't English, because its clunky clichés, hastily delivered as if they're hard-hitting extravagantly stranded bona fides, are precise yet sloppy, inasmuch as a Native speaker would likely do a better job of covering up their emotionless tact.

That's likely what I would sound like writing in another language if I overemphasized my fluency anyways.

Had everything been slown down a bit and a slight comedic element attached, with a lot more gore, this aspect would have been more appreciated.

That isn't to say the film's all bad.

The soundtrack's fantastic and it ends well.

It made me think of David Bowie's first album, upon which you'll hear the origins of unparalleled songwriter awkwardly developing his genius chops.

More time and care and perhaps Dejan Zecevic will pull it together for a Diamond Dogs or two, a Rebel Rebel, a Young Americans.

'Tis the season.

Scouts Guide to the Zombie Apocalypse

If vampire narratives were constructed long ago to suggest that the European aristocracy was carelessly gorging itself on the life blood of the European worker, and zombie narratives countered this characterization by connoting that the European worker was simply jealous of the aristocratic mind, Scouts Guide to the Zombie Apocalypse asks the questions, "where do American scouts scouting in small town America fit into this dilemma?, and how can scouting build bridges between classes who solely work, and those who only play"?, scouting thereby redefined as a constructive democratic bourgeois intensity.

There are no vampires in Scouts Guide but there is an exclusive gathering, the sons and daughters of the capitalistic elite, the cool kids, in attendance, our scouting heroes given the wrong address in direct humiliation.

The zombies spread after a lackadaisical janitor interrupts a scientific experiment, accidentally awaking a zombie, who then rapidly devours his misplaced curiosity.

Soon the majority of the town is infected as the scouts unknowingly camp out in the woods, and the cool kids cavalierly consort, blissfully unaware.

But soon these 3 scouts must emerge from the forest to apply their skills in battle, aided by a savvy cocktail waitress thereafter, in their unheralded altruistic calling.

Friendship is on the line as two of them are thinking of quitting scouts and one remains true to their cause.

The zombies's hunger leaves them little time to air grievances however, as they fight together as one to save those who ignorantly disdained them.

Thus, since the zombies have been coerced into blindly embracing ideological dogma, and the capitalistic progeny is too young to understand why, the scouts must jurisprudently save them from an unprovoked attack, having tried to save at least one zombie beforehand, while hoping the virus can one day be cured.

Attendee Kendall Grant (Halston Sage) is impressed and expresses her gratitude physically.

Is it juvenile, insufficiently serious, undeniably heroic and fun?, who am I to say?

I thought perhaps the scouts weren't scouting prominently enough for a lot of the film, but the grand finale ingeniously made amends.

It is fun.

I think I saw a bear zombie, a human who had been bit by a zombie bear.

No werebears though, no werebears.

Transcendence

Transcendence is kind of a flop.

But it is fun to think about what happens in the film.

It explores the possibilities of uploading one's consciousness online and then existing cyberexistentially.

Dr. Will Caster (Johnny Depp) and his wife Evelyn (Rebecca Hall) are conducting the research.

An underground organization fears their pursuits and launches a strike with the goal of obliterating them.

They hit Mr. Caster with a poisonous bullet which will kill him if he can't find a way to put said research into action.

Which he does, uploading himself, becoming a socially conscious superbeing thereafter.

His might, strength, reach and power then alarm law enforcement agencies previously dedicated to preserving his life.

Identity becomes an issue: is this superbeing Will Caster or a different person altogether?

Law enforcement reps begin to work with the still determined underground organization to break through the impregnable infrastructure Caster has created.

He's found a way to use nanotechnology to both regenerate physical material almost immediately after its bombardment/disintegration and save the lives of terminally ill individuals. 

Whose minds he then enters and whose bodies he can then control, turning them into his loyal zombie soldiers.

Loyal zombie soldiers are his undoing; he never should have interfered with his patient's abilities to think and act freely.

He does though, and doesn't bother to share his plans to use his power to solve manifold environmental issues, an objective brought about by his love for Evelyn, who feels guilty for having worked with the resistance after discovering this fact, and its unfortunate benevolent despotism.

Transcendence suggests that unlimited secretive superpower may unite institutional and rebellious forces since they will likely both be frightened by its omnipresence, and will therefore, try to stop it.

There are a lot of great ideas in the film, and some great lines, but this one's a definite rental, that can be paused from time to time to acquire additional snacks.

The Neighbor Zombie (Fantasia Fest 2010)

Was impressed by the 2009 South Korean horror flick The Neighbor Zombie. Presenting a series of 6 vignettes directed by Hong Young-Guen, Jang Youn-Jung, Oh Young-Doo, and Ryoo Hoon, loosely tied together by a traditional zombie narrative (a plague spreads, zombies attack, humans fight back), The Neighbor Zombie treads new ground (or at least zombie ground with which I'm unfamiliar) insofar as in the end the survivors discover a cure for the living dead and examine the politics surrounding reintegrating them into society. The ex-zombies have trouble finding work, making ends meet, and dealing with vengeful living relatives of their victims, and this quotidian dimension provides The Neighbor Zombie with an intellectual flair inasmuch as it piquantly showcases the troubling ubiquitous day-to-day realities governing the post-zombie holocaust (it's nice to see a zombie film that doesn't primarily present a hopeless situation wherein a ragtag bunch of would-be-heroes do their best to kick ass [I'm not saying that Zombieland wasn't exceptional]). There's also a troubled daughter who loves her zombie mom and keeps her locked up, feeding her blood and strangers because she simply can't say goodbye. Not to mention that the zombie virus isn't as immediate as it is in other zombie films and it can take weeks/months for the infected to transform completely, one young couple unyieldingly holding on to their relationship as the young adult male slowly mutates. Add a new drug which can make you 'zombie high,' a volatile conversation examining communal versus familial responsibility, 4 directors successfully committed to providing their own unique contribution to a mutually agreed upon uniform aesthetic (I'm assuming), and a bizarro kid who slices off his foot and eats it, and you've got a cerebral treat for your quasi-somnabulistic senses; just try and make sure you don't plan to go grocery shopping immediately afterwards.

Zombieland

Keep to the path and follow the rules, unless, of course, you're in search of a twinkie. Ruben Fleischer's Zombieland hilariously and absurdly chronicles the death-defying feats of four post-zombie take over survivors in the United States of America. When a hopeless situation arises there's always a serendipitous solution. If your neighbour suddenly turns into a flesh craving representative of the undead, remember the double tap. While fleeing the legions of zombies seeking to devour your post-pestilanic consciousness, make sure to pursue a little romance. And if in doubt, thoroughly express your rage but don't forget to fasten your seatbelt.

Legions of the undead is perhaps to strong a phrase insofar as Tallahassee (Woody Harrelson) and Columbus (Jesse Eisenberg) find themselves ditched and weaponless in a town whose resident zombies are curiously abstaining from their cannibalistic pursuits; but this is an absurd campy comedy whose internal chemistry supports such logical inconsistencies. Give 'em the finger, when a weapon's been used once, discard it; beware of clever fast-talking survivalists (Emma Stone as Wichita and Abigail Breslin as Little Rock); and it's never to late to check out Pacific Playland. If you're going to function as an individual, things are bound to be tough; and uniting your interests in order to obtain common objectives requires a cultivated degree of expedient trust (your chances of succeeding being ridiculously sublime) (in the beginning you have plenty of opportunity to proceed unnoticed). The showdown will eventually come and your success is dependent upon the reception of your cultural/musical/political/commercial/ . . . aesthetic. Just follow the lead of these four reluctant heroes and you're bound to receive critical acclaim.

Chanbara Beauty (Fantasia Fest 2008)

If you're looking for a zombie flick starring two of the hottest zombie slaying babes to ever slice and dice legions of the undead, Yohei Fokuda's Chanbara Beauty will diplomatically detonate your appetite.

Based on a series of video games from Japanese publisher Tamsoft and D3, Chanbara Beauty unravels in a world populated by the living dead, created in (larger-than-life) mad-scientist Sugita's laboratories. Sugita believes the ancient and purebred blood of a prominent Japanese family will supply him with the ingredient he needs to create obedient super-zombies with whom he can rule the world. In order to do this, he lures Saki (Chise Nakamura), the clan's jealous younger sister, into a sinister plot whereby she becomes his Queen after he murders her unsuspecting father. In retaliation, her older and more talented sister Aya (Eri Otoguro) embarks upon a unilateral and ferociously focused quest for revenge, with the accompaniment of motorcycle-riding-machine-gun-toting Reiko (Manami Hashimoto) and the only Japanese man who eats once every three days and still weighs 280+ pounds.

The secret to Chanbara's beauty is its complete lack of pretension. Inconsequential logical inconsistencies abound which make it evermore the endearing each and every time Aya flips off her dainty cape to reveal her sultry bikini-clad cowboy-hat-wearing frame, in the middle of battle. Reiko's hot too, as is the treacherous Saki, who, during the film's dénouement demonstrates that even the living dead can embody the tenacious and transcendent spirit from whom their lineage was cast.

Do members of the aristocracy possess a god-like heritage which legitimizes their political prowess? Are zombies symbolic representations of the working class and those who attempt to harness their power symbolic dictators who care not for their impoverished needs?

These are questions which Chanbara Beauty thankfully does not try to answer, insofar as their intellectual assiduity would have crushed its kitschy commerce. Some may say it’s just a fun, dumb, run of the schlock zombie flick, with hot babes, and zombie's whom bullets cannot kill, but others, possessing more insight, looking towards the future, will likely note Chanbara's evanescent essence, wherein the entertainment provided by both video games and films are inflamed.

Favourite scene: in the opening moments when Aya leaps into the air and then balances herself by placing each of her high heels into a different zombie's face.

Mulberry Street (Fantasia Fest 2007)

Mulberry Street is a really touching horror film. It’s one of the few horror flicks where I found myself genuinely caring for the characters and legitimately crushed when some of them bit it. Director Jim Mickle co-wrote the script with Nick Damici who also stars as Clutch, and the two manage to imbue the work with a romantic depth and gentle sensibility that one doesn't expect to find in a film about infected rats biting the citizens of Manhatten, turning them into blood sucking rat zombies. Mickle also tackles the process of gentrification within, deftly pointing out that reconstructing a neighbourhood has dire consequences for its impoverished residents. The rats come across like wealthy developers poisoning the region's humanity, turning friends against one another, leaving the poor with nothing to do but devour each other. A powerful horror flick with a poignant message, hang a right down Mulberry Street if you get the chance, and stay for a cup of delicately brewed scorching hot rat blood.