Undead Review
by Andrew Staker (adonis_love AT hotmail DOT com)September 23rd, 2003
UNDEAD
That fact that Australia has produced a genre film is a point of excitement; it's a refreshing change from dreary melodramas or drearier comedies. Now known as the Spierig Brothers, Brisbane's Michael and Peter have gone 'all out' with their take on the zombie films of a few decades ago.
In a sweet-as-sunshine town in the outback, everything seems fine. We meet our characters in their normal situations. There's the young married couple, the Fish Queen beauty pageant winner and the town weirdo who has an amazing house and an even more amazing collection of weapons.
When mysterious meteorites cascade through the sky, and start hitting the townsfolk, you know Undead is underway. Whoever gets hit by a piece of cosmic rock turns into a flesh-eating zombie. To stay alive, it's natural for our foursome to flee. What's frustrating is that it takes them a while to work out that shooting a zombie through the head (or some other way of smashing its brain) is the only way to kill an undead being.
The sky grows increasingly gloomier and the tension rises. The comedy works even if you have no idea who George A Romero is; but of course, the references to zombie classics made the audience laugh just that bit more. The fact that aliens are intimately involved with the narrative takes the movie in a slightly different direction to orthodox zombie films. The special effects are self-conscious and at no point does the film take itself seriously. This might, of course, upset genre purists.
Given their meagre financial parameters, the Spierigs have created an Australian horror flick with tinges of local in-jokes. It's also interesting to note that the film rose out of obscurity through Sydney and Melbourne film festivals and has achieved a nation-wide release.
This is entertaining. Any underlying moral message that earlier films carried has been shaved off Undead. It is just a fast-paced stay-alive-or-else horror comedy with its highest aspiration being to make the audience giggle unstoppably in their seats. And at this, it succeeds, for the most part.
Andrew Staker
Originally posted in the rec.arts.movies.reviews newsgroup. Copyright belongs to original author unless otherwise stated. We take no responsibilities nor do we endorse the contents of this review.
