Welsh writer/director James Plumb sure has balls to name his film after George Romero's classic zombie movie, but sadly he doesn't quite have the talent to do the title justice: his writing skills aren't all that bad, the film's familial drama being reasonably effective thanks to believable dialogue bolstered by surprisingly convincing performances, but his project as a whole suffers from a lack of decent zombie action, poorly judged camera placement, weak editing, and one or two scenes crippled by a severe lack of logic from the characters.
After a false start ala Hitchcock's Psycho (which actually provides the best moment in the film), the plot centres on a family trapped in their rural home by a plague of zombies, and as tension mounts and their number slowly dwindles, the characters begin to reveal their flaws and secrets, and relationships break down. This interaction of characters works fairly well, but the film's flaws are too numerous and impossible to ignore (individually, some of the following may sound like petty niggles, but together they really serve to irritate)
Firstly, Terry Victor as Gerald sports eyebrows so bushy that zombies would be hard pushed to get close enough to bite him (and as it happens, they don't). Also rather frustrating is the fact that no attempt has been made to fortify the house—hell, they don't even lock the back door after going outside! Furthermore, the family seem a little slow on the uptake, not realising that the 'crazies' are in fact the dead brought back to life (a headline in the newspaper shop in the first scene states that The Dead Live—haven't they been following the news?).
Then there's the technical issues: the overuse of canted angles, which looks like Plumb forgot to lock-off his tripod properly, and inappropriate low POV shots, as if the the camera was left on the ground still running between takes, all of which give the film an air of amateurishness.
But it's back to Gerald for my biggest complaint: when faced with a gang of machete wielding chavs, the bushy-browed fool stops his car (instead of ploughing straight through them) and pays for his stupid mistake with his life. It's dumb beyond belief.
While not nearly as bad as many of the other reviews make out (I reserve my '1/10's for completely unwatchable dross that actually makes my eyes hurt), the film is certainly undeserving of its 'Night of
' title.
