Recent Reviews
Short Film Review: Zombie Movie
By John Marrone
May 16, 2006, 11:17

Directed by:  Michael Asquith and Ben Stenbeck
Running Time:  14 minutes
Body Count:  4

Trailer (flash)

Don't sit there and boast, "Man, I wish the dead would rise!"  because most of you dont have a worthy weapon, or are near heavily populated areas.  If it did happen, it would come as unexpected as 9/11 - and most of ya's wouldn't make it, no matter how much you think you would.  In fact, the stinkin reality of it is, that you'd probably get stuck in a car somewhere, out of gas and cigarettes, with three of your (insert "dipshit" synonym here) friends - quick to get on your nerves - whose intelligence or lack thereof may be more dangerous than anything the bowels of Hell could spew forth.  Its 1986 in New Zealand, and the zombie apocalypse has arrived as Zombie Movie, brilliantly directed and produced by Michael Asquith and Ben Stenbeck.

Asquith, an effects artist who worked on the Lord of the Rings trilogy, and Stenbeck, a comic book illustrator, created Zombie Movie in their off-hours as a low-tech homage to the living dead, resulting in a keeper of a horror short that will live amongst your living dead libraries - probably just to the right of Lucio Fulci's Zombie, if you keep things in titular alphabetical order.  Severed heads, vomiting pals, cannibalism, maggot ridden zombies, gaping wounds, pain, attempted murder, and impeding death - yet you'll laugh all the way through.  The "horror-comedy" has been nailed in the forehead.  Bullseye.

The story takes place inside a car - a Holden to be exact - within which are three bogans (metalheads) equipped with cassette tapes, a couple cigarettes, some chips, and a pocket knife.  Outside the broken-down car are a thousand zombies, waiting patiently inches beyond the vomit-streaked windows for their inevitable feast.   There's no chance in hell of running for it, as one of them has already found out the hard way.  Nicotine withdrawl is setting in fast.  Food is about gone.  Each of the men are unraveling at the seams.

Classic zombie-survival situations here.  How do you manage going to the bathroom in a car?  If you're out of gas, how do you refuel the car from the inside?  When you realize life is done, and you want to end it all - how do you pull it off?   With 1000 zombies clawing at your doors and windows, how the hell do you escape?  These questions and many more will be answered.  Funniest scene in the entire movie has to be when the guy in the backseat decides to end his life.  He wants to die, he knows his friends are starving, so he offers himself as food - as long as they don't eat his "cocknballs".

Comedy fans will laugh outloud.  This short is as funny as it is graphically violent.  Gore and fans of the undead need not look elsewhere for some good zombie gore.  The film drips with yellow putridity, gurgles and vomits, buzzes and squirms.  Plenty of rotting flesh and classic living dead characters lumbering outside the vehicle - barely focused on, but detailed and decomposing - giving every effects junkie plenty of gaze at.  Green skin, gas distended eyelids, meat-ripping sound effects - Ive been a fan of zombie films my whole life and I can't help but rave about this one.  Run, don't walk, to the link below, and download Steam.  Its free - just need about a Gig free on the hard drive - and in no time Zombie Movie will be downloading onto your desktop in all its festering glory.  No people, that's no hot dog he's eating... 

Final analysis:   Zombie Movie is the best zombie short film out there.  Perfect blend of laugh-out-loud comedy and blood-thirst quenching horror.  The zombies are 100% "Romero-like" - slow and rotten - the way they should be, and detailed more than any short-viewer deserves.  Fans of the living dead, wait no longer - click below and download Zombie Movie now!

Visit 2Chums.com for info on how you can watch ZOMBIE MOVIE for free today...

CLICK HERE to check out our recent exclusive interview with Zombie Movie director, Michael Asquith