Zombie Bloodbath 2

As any sequel worth its salt should, Zombie Bloodbath 2 knocks things up a few notches. Longer runtime by 20 minutes, more plot and a considerable added dollop of human depravity to the mix, it all comes together to make for a solidly watchable rock bottom trash opus. Interestingly it seems to take place in a different continuum to the first film, making it less a sequel than a different vision. This time around the zombies have demonic inspiration, they rise as the result of blood spilled upon unholy ground. Three slimy escaped convicts hole up with various hostages in a farmhouse whilst at the same time two even slimier crooks terrorise the staff of an all night gas station, events build and build until both parties must face an onslaught of gut hungry zombies. Its a good decision to take the focus away from the zombies for a good portion of the films length, it means instead of repetitive intestine chewing from near the outset there's actually some vague sense of character and even suspense. Well actually there isn't much sense of character or suspense, but some of the events are surprising/interesting, the dialogue is often fun (read hysterical) and one or two actors really bring their A (read Z, but in the best possible way) game. The trumps are definitely awesomely mulleted Jerry Angel and Matthew Jason Walsh as the two truly nasty crims, all nervous energy, wild expressions and continual jabbering taunts, they give a great charge to their scenes. Harry Rose carries himself with a decent gruff authority as a US Marshall as well, while the rest of the cast do their best, all generally enthusiastic enough to please. The zombies in this one are pretty variable, at first they appear made up with even less care than the original but as the film goes on they do improve with some OK gory wounds. I wasn't too convinced by the first attacking wave being decked out in things like a UCLA hoodie or Lakers gear though, didn't really support the idea of their being menacing long undead fiends. Gore is about what one would expect, lots of entrails, lots of red gloop, a few shootings, stabbings etc and some entertaining spectacle in the finale (definitely one of the high points of the trilogy). It was spoilt at times by use of black and white, slow motion, out of focus shots and crudely edited Satanic imagery though, a no frills approach would have been much better. Pretty standard blaring generic death metal on the soundtrack, mediocre but bringing the right sort of mood. I can't exactly say that this is a good film on the whole, but its a good ride for what it is. If you like micro-budget, pretty much amateur splatter trash then its definitely worth a watch, if you don't its definitely one to avoid. 7/10 from me as I like this sort of thing

Jerry Angell, owner of zombie-horror's finest mullet, returns for more undead action in the sequel to director Todd Sheets' atrocious home-made gore-fest Zombie Bloodbath. This time around, Jerry plays a sleazy low-life thug who, along with his equally despicable partner-in-crime, some escaped convicts, several teenagers, and a bunch of screaming girls, comes face-to-face with a horde of shambling, flesh-eating corpses.

Obviously having learnt zilch about improving his craft in the two years since Zombie Bloodbath, Sheets delivers another shoddy mess of a film that somehow manages to be even worse than the original—a feat that I thought was almost impossible to achieve. The acting is uniformly lousy, the effects amateurish and cheap (most of the gore appears to be nothing more than a selection of offcuts, offal and blood from the local butcher's shop), the story incomprehensible (as far as I could fathom, the zombies rise from the dead because a scarecrow commands them to!!!), and the direction frustratingly laden with cheap looking video effects and completely meaningless cuts to black-and-white.

And as if that wasn't enough to convince you of this film's complete lack of redeeming features, the simply mind-bogglingly moronic ending should do the trick: the few remaining survivors stumble upon an abandoned truck that conveniently happens to have a stash of flesh-eating bacteria laying on its passenger seat—just the thing for dissolving the undead (but, strangely enough, not at all detrimental to the living).

When I say worse, I mean less entertaining. Todd Sheets seems to have learned some stupid camera tricks since the last Zombie Bloodbath, which makes the movie even less tolerable. In the last movie there were no special camera effects, where in this one, we are treated to shaky cam, and constant switching to black and white. Also, this is called Zombie Bloodbath, despite the fact that the zombies are barely in this one. The movie starts in 1945, where some satanists kill a violent burglar and put him up as a scarecrow. Back in modern time, some kids have a car problem and go to a house, the same house in which the satanist murder happened. Some mean people try to rape the kids (or something), and they bring the scarecrow burglar back to life, who comes back with some zombies and now talks like Darth Vader. Mr. Sheets amped up the language and lessened the violence. If you want to see what a bad movie is, check this out!

My rating: BOMB/****. 96 mins. Not rated, contains violence and language.

Alright, so I really didn't like the original Zombie Bloodbath. This sequel is still bad, but an improvement over the original. This film had more originality. It had some different kills, but still mostly more of the same, but at least you got to know some of the characters a little. Apparently, this movie has a point to it, and some social commentary I didn't catch, since it was basically poorly done. I give Todd Sheets credit for trying, but overall he failed to deliver the point of his film too well. I noticed one of the guys from the first one played one of the bad guys, kind of funny to see one of the original characters return in this movie, and see him die exactly the same way he died in the original...screaming exactly the same way...trying to be someone totally different. That was funny to me, and the fact that he had what looked like a cheap dollar store gun in his hand. Ahhh the fun this movie is, but the pain it caused. I figure if ZOmbie Bloodbath was terrible, and this was bad, maybe the 3rd will be decent?

"you can't take it realistically." -sheets

Zombie Bloodbath 2 (ZB2) is a world all of its own. I've really never seen anything like it. The only thing I can think to compare it to is psychedelic drugs. Forgive the cliché—I don't simply mean that it's incoherent and absurd, though occasionally it is. I mean that it takes you through such a broad range of intense experiences and unexpected emotions so quickly as to overwhelm you, and when it's over, you find that it's all happened while you were sitting on the couch.

It is worth noting that it's extremely low-budget, as a disclaimer to those who, after seeing "Shaun of the Dead," consider themselves fans of underground zombie films. Also of note is that it is much more "brutal" than you'd expect. Children get disemboweled, and someone taunts a teenage girl before shooting her in the groin. Her corpse is subsequently "raped." These are certainly not flaws, and indeed I feel it is to the film's credit. But if it doesn't sound like your kind of movie, don't waste your time.

(I don't mean to over-hype it, regarding brutality. Don't go in expecting "Inside" or something.) I hesitate to give away any of the plot, because it's really full of surprises. Even the opening scene, which has nothing to do with zombies, is at once a classic horror scene and something quite original.

Man, I'm three paragraphs in and I've hardly said anything at all. Here's why I thought the movie was awesome: 1. It's big, and it keeps moving. At one point, you expect it to turn into another NotLD clone, a board-up-the-windows movie where everyone stays in a farmhouse and argues with one another. By the end of the film, however, the farmhouse scenes will seem like a distant dream. There are also a number of outdoor, urban scenes. These are rare in low-budget zombie films.

2. The makeup/gore is much better than ZB1. More convincing and more creative. Something kind of funny: the early zombies look really lame. Then, halfway through, they suddenly look really good, with prosthetics and everything. Some of them look like Fulci zombies, some are reminiscent of Mr. Tongue from "Day of the Dead." And it's got big scenes of dozens of zombies shuffling around. Never gets old.

3. There's something oddly emotional about it. One character asserts that heaven exists, and that our dead/undead protagonists are now in heaven. In the context of the film, we believe it to be true. Though the characters behave with typical horror film stupidity, they genuinely seem to care about each other, and accordingly, I found myself caring about them.

4. The pacing is great. There's hardly a dull moment.

My only observation that borders on criticism is that Todd Sheets comes up with the most bizarre dialog I've ever heard. I personally feel it adds to the experience, but I don't think he does it on purpose, so I can't fairly give the film a perfect rating. (Example: when a car breaks down, the owner yells at the passengers. Then he says something to the effect of, "Sorry I yelled at you guys. You don't know what it's like to have your dad standing over you with a straight razor when you're five years old." wtf?) At the very end, it gets to be more than I can handle. Involves a montage with Bill Clinton, and then some preachy end credits explaining the zombie metaphor. Really, by this point, I was firmly re-living my drug experiences.

Highly recommended. 7/10.