Zone of the Dead

This is a cheap, poor, unoriginal direct-to-DVD ultra-low budgeter that will satisfy only the most undemanding. If you liked the ugly, careless Italian zombie flicks from the early 1980s made by Claudio Fragasso and Bruno Mattei, this is a perfect match to that kind of dated, barely competent attempt at exploitation. It is not entirely without its saving graces: Ken Foree is as good as the silly, uninventive script and laughable dialogues allow; make-up efx are solid, but barely visibly because of the overuse of shaky-cam which spoils every action scene. Photography is dark, grainy and shaky, and the Tarzan-English spoken by the Serbian actors can be compared to the Engrish found in Miike's SUKIYAKI WESTERN DJANGO. Solid potentials are largely wasted in this silly little flick.

I'm not sure if this even counts as a review, but I'm a hardcore zombie flick fan. If its been made and it has zombies in it, chances are I own it. So I've come across my fair share of low budget movies and cheesy acting in my time, but absolutely nothing compares to this film.

Straight up, I couldn't sit through the whole film. The acting is so wooden, and the dialogue is so forced, that watching it seems like you're indulging children putting on a once-rehearsed play. Apparently it was translated from Serbian by a brain-damaged hamster. The average guy on the street could give a better performance than almost every single member of the cast, with a few "yeah okay" exceptions.

If you're a fan of zombie movies, don't rent or buy this piece of crap. It scores nil on all draws. I give it ten severed thumbs down.

Firstly the good news. Ken Foree is an absolute legend and it's great to see him returning to the zombie horror genre.

And now for the bad news, which is absolutely everything else. Having read some good reviews on this film, I decided to give it a go as I'm a big fan of zombie flicks even bad ones. It isn't often that I can't watch a film to the end (The Country Bears being the last one - I even made it through the Squeakquel) but at the half way mark I felt like eating my own head. Around two thirds of the way through I couldn't take any more and fast forwarded through the rest, stopping every so often to see if it improved. It didn't.

Allow me to list off some of the things that made this the worst movie I have ever seen.

1. The dubbing. At least I hope it was all dubbed. If these idiots really speak like this, they should all be shot.

2. The acting. OMG! Where did they get these muppets from? Everything was wrong and I do realise that zombie movies rarely get Oscar nominations. The body language was completely wooden - not one person (including Ken) managed to look like they really were in the midst of a zombie apocalypse. They looked like they were taking part in a primary school play and a bad one at that.

3. The plot. Seems like the same terrible primary school did the screen writing as well. If you were responsible for the script then you should be ashamed. Never, ever write anything again. I mean it. Put the pen down. Bite your fingers off. You'll be doing us all a favour.

If I can prevent one person from ever having to go through watching this drivel, then I can rest easy knowing my sacrifice wasn't in vain.

You've been warned...

InterPol agents join forces with a dangerous prisoner to fend off the zombie hordes.

Zone of the Dead is a zombie actioner produced in Serbia. Many low budget zombie films are still effective, however, Zone of Dead isn't one of them and is poorly put together.

Stefano Caprioli's score is good but it's unevenly placed over the film, at times distracting. The same can be said for the sound. The make up effects are well done and the setting adds atmosphere. There's a handful of sets ups with a little sword and gun play. Milan Todorovic and Vukota Brajovic's story is adequate. Directors Milan Konjevic and Milan Todorovic over use the shaky cam look and there's no getting away from Konjevic's sub-par screenplay.

Kristina Klebe as Agent Mina Milius lights up the screen and of course there's Ken Foree but they can't save that poor script which is badly delivered by the majority of rest of the cast.

It faults are to distracting for you to sit back and enjoy it as much as it may deserve. All the ingredients are there but someone wasn't watching the cooking times. True DTV hell.

This one is another zombie flick from a non-Hollywood production. In the passed years we have seen so many movies based on the contamination-turns- men-to-zombies from around the world (even Thailand). To be honest, this particular movie could have been much better 'cause the atmosphere is good and creepy, the zombies are greatly done and the action is OK. But all this package is ruined by the poor (to non-existent) performance of the actors/actresses and the bad -not to say crap- lines. BUT -yes there is a BUT here- if you're a fan of those bloodthirsty creatures called zombies, walkers etc and you love to see shooting, chopping and all the relevant stuff these movies produce and provide, you can gather some friends, make some popcorn, watch it and then, turn off your DVD and just forget about it.