Youkai tengoku: Ghost Hero aka Monster Heaven: Ghost
Hero (1990): The titular ghost hero might be the wettest blanket who
ever won the reluctant hero contest, and the yokai costumes in this rather
confused comedy/horror/fantasy thing are mostly godawful. Macoto Tezuka’s (Osamu
Tezuka’s son, if the IMDB info is correct) film also suffers from a bad case of
feet-dragging, with little of interest happening in the first forty minutes of
this 73 minute film.
The crazy that then arrives is not really enough to turn things around but at
least we get a demonic samurai, lots of talk about virginity and the really
rather unforgettable scene of a (toy) skyscraper-sized woman crunching on (the
toy version of) said samurai. Well, and the rather disturbing info that yokai
are now in rock bands.
Rites of Spring (2011): This bit of indie horror by Padraig
Reynolds looks rather good, is well paced, well enough acted and still isn’t all
that interesting. Its attempt to pair up a well-worn type of crime film with a
just as well-worn type of horror movie is probably an attempt at the next best
thing to originality but the way the two plot lines connect in the end feels
most of all contrived (with another, absolutely needless contrivance added for
funsies). There’s just so little there here, except for enough
technical ability in front of and behind the camera to make you go “’s okay, I
guess” after watching it.
The Dead 2: India (2013): I’m not as happy with the second
The Dead film as I was with the first one. The Ford Brothers are still
very fine budget directors, and this is a perfectly watchable and entertaining
film with half a dozen or so scenes that are more than just that, but as a
whole, I found this one much less impressive. The zombies are less creepy, the
plot’s attempts at Hinduism and melodrama are somewhat risible, and the acting’s
through the bank not very good, with everyone being a bit shriller than
necessary or helpful.
Showing posts with label jon ford. Show all posts
Showing posts with label jon ford. Show all posts
Sunday, May 15, 2016
Sunday, April 3, 2016
The Dead (2010)
Welcome to another zombie apocalypse. Large parts of Africa have been overrun
(or in this case really over-shambled) by the walking dead and the Europeans and
the Americans are evacuating their people. American Military engineer Brian
Murphy (Rob Freeman) is on the last flight out of the continent. The plane
crashes somewhere over a West African country, though, with Brian ending up as
the only survivor. Brian makes his way across country with vague plans to
somehow get out and get back home. His knowledge of things mechanic and
electronic at least enables him to get an old, rusted car working.
Early on, Brian meets Daniel (Prince David Oseia), a deserted soldier trying to make his way to a military base to the far north where he hopes to find his young son. Somewhat reluctantly, the two team up – at first, Daniel’s only supposed to show Brian the way to a small military airport (the big ones have all been bombed by the US military so that nobody can flee the country and possibly infect white people) where the engineer hopes to rig something flyable up, but when that falls through, the men decide to try to reach the northern base together, crossing through much of the rural West African apocalypse.
Given the unending masses of zombie movies that shamble across all kinds of screens, it is little wonder I’ve only now seen Howard J. and Jon Ford’s (working as the Ford Brothers) piece about zombie apocalypse taking place in Africa, particularly since “it’s the zombie apocalypse, but in an unnamed West African country!” does sound like a rather gimmicky approach to the end of the world on film.
As it turns out, the plot’s location is not a gimmick but an important part of the film’s approach to zombies. Where most films of the genre concentrate either on cities or the country as post-apocalyptic survivalist wet dream and/or nightmare, The Dead is involved in the moment when the world hasn’t quite ended yet, with Africa going first through a combination of an infrastructure destroyed or hampered by decades of proxy wars, the bloody consequences of colonialism and imperialism, and general human inhumanity, with the rest of the world clearly only interested in the continent’s troubles as much as it doesn’t want to catch them too. While this sounds like a very political movie, these aspects of the plot are rather downplayed, running in the background as part of its world building more than anything. If you’re unkind, you might even complain that a film taking place in West Africa still has a white American hero, and I don’t think you’d be completely wrong.
On the other hand, when it comes to the type of zombie film about basically competent, basically decent, people stumbling through a normal world that has freshly turned into hell, this one’s a real low budget gem. It’s well-paced, well-acted by Oseia and Freeman, and (until the somewhat too cheesy end) with a clear vision of what it wants to be and how to achieve it.
Take for example the zombies. These aren’t your at the moment more typical loud fast zombies, nor the kind of slow shamblers that only become a threat en masse. Instead, the Fords opt for scattered, very slow, yet also very silent zombies whose main claim to danger is their complete relentlessness. These things don’t ever stop - if you’re sleeping, drinking, or just trying to rest for a bit, they just come and come and come at you until you’re as dead as they are, something the film emphasises again and again. Add to this approach some fantastic zombie acting - the people playing the dead often create a very real impression that these aren’t people anymore, or infected, but truly soulless husks that only know to follow and to bite - and you have zombies that are always creepy, and very often truly frightening again, shambling through a landscape that is at times beautiful, at times oppressive in its emptiness, and at times claustrophobia inducing. It’s such a pure and concentrated approach to zombies I’d love the film for them alone.
I really don’t need to, though, for the same calm, thoughtful and careful approach the Ford Brothers take to their zombies they also take concerning the rest of their film, with very little that doesn’t just work, and work very well, making The Dead something pretty special in my book.
Early on, Brian meets Daniel (Prince David Oseia), a deserted soldier trying to make his way to a military base to the far north where he hopes to find his young son. Somewhat reluctantly, the two team up – at first, Daniel’s only supposed to show Brian the way to a small military airport (the big ones have all been bombed by the US military so that nobody can flee the country and possibly infect white people) where the engineer hopes to rig something flyable up, but when that falls through, the men decide to try to reach the northern base together, crossing through much of the rural West African apocalypse.
Given the unending masses of zombie movies that shamble across all kinds of screens, it is little wonder I’ve only now seen Howard J. and Jon Ford’s (working as the Ford Brothers) piece about zombie apocalypse taking place in Africa, particularly since “it’s the zombie apocalypse, but in an unnamed West African country!” does sound like a rather gimmicky approach to the end of the world on film.
As it turns out, the plot’s location is not a gimmick but an important part of the film’s approach to zombies. Where most films of the genre concentrate either on cities or the country as post-apocalyptic survivalist wet dream and/or nightmare, The Dead is involved in the moment when the world hasn’t quite ended yet, with Africa going first through a combination of an infrastructure destroyed or hampered by decades of proxy wars, the bloody consequences of colonialism and imperialism, and general human inhumanity, with the rest of the world clearly only interested in the continent’s troubles as much as it doesn’t want to catch them too. While this sounds like a very political movie, these aspects of the plot are rather downplayed, running in the background as part of its world building more than anything. If you’re unkind, you might even complain that a film taking place in West Africa still has a white American hero, and I don’t think you’d be completely wrong.
On the other hand, when it comes to the type of zombie film about basically competent, basically decent, people stumbling through a normal world that has freshly turned into hell, this one’s a real low budget gem. It’s well-paced, well-acted by Oseia and Freeman, and (until the somewhat too cheesy end) with a clear vision of what it wants to be and how to achieve it.
Take for example the zombies. These aren’t your at the moment more typical loud fast zombies, nor the kind of slow shamblers that only become a threat en masse. Instead, the Fords opt for scattered, very slow, yet also very silent zombies whose main claim to danger is their complete relentlessness. These things don’t ever stop - if you’re sleeping, drinking, or just trying to rest for a bit, they just come and come and come at you until you’re as dead as they are, something the film emphasises again and again. Add to this approach some fantastic zombie acting - the people playing the dead often create a very real impression that these aren’t people anymore, or infected, but truly soulless husks that only know to follow and to bite - and you have zombies that are always creepy, and very often truly frightening again, shambling through a landscape that is at times beautiful, at times oppressive in its emptiness, and at times claustrophobia inducing. It’s such a pure and concentrated approach to zombies I’d love the film for them alone.
I really don’t need to, though, for the same calm, thoughtful and careful approach the Ford Brothers take to their zombies they also take concerning the rest of their film, with very little that doesn’t just work, and work very well, making The Dead something pretty special in my book.
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