Call of the Undead

Well I must say that I was also riding along on the hype-wave about this being Taiwan's first zombie movie, so I had put up some big hopes and expectations for the movie, especially as I was really surprised by "Juan of the Dead" ("Juan de los Muertos") from Cuba. So these movies just go to prove that you don't need a massive backing up from Hollywood in order to make a good zombie movie.

And now having seen "Z108" I will say that I wasn't surprised, and I think that they actually managed to pull it off nicely enough. Sure there were some mistakes here and there, but in overall, I think that Joe Chein managed to make an impressive movie, so Taiwan can now be ticked off on the zombie world map.

The story in "Z108" is about a scientist who had discovered a new gene, but the gene caused unforeseen changes and mutations. With a couple of disasters striking his life, the material gets unleashed upon a part of Taipei, and we find ourselves along with a SWAT group, as they strike down upon the infected area. But in the middle of the chaos is a local gang, totally unaware of the chaos that is unfolding around them. The two groups, SWAT and gang members, have to unite and put aside their differences in order to overcome the common threat of the ravenous zombies.

Yeah, the storyline itself was fairly average for a zombie movie, and it wasn't really anything that you hadn't seen before in other movies of this genre. But still, it was entertaining enough.

The zombie make-up and effects were actually quite good, although it wasn't as gore-filled as some of the Western or Japanese zombie movies can be. But there was a decent enough amount of blood and mayhem, and I was kept entertained by it, though I could have wished for a bit more.

As for the acting, well I think that people were doing good enough jobs with their roles. It wasn't really anything outstanding or overly impressive, but it was above low-budget standards. And I wasn't familiar with anyone in the movie, as I haven't really had much chance to watch Taiwanese movies in general, so it was nice to see a movie with all new faces and not have any prior idea of their acting and previous characters associated with their faces.

There were a couple of things that didn't fall into my personal liking in this movie. The first was the speed of which people turned into zombies, it took less than a couple of minutes; but to make matters worse, then for some reason, newly deceased people that came back as zombies had decaying and mangled faces, even though prior to dying their faces were intact. That was just a tad too stupid. The second thing was the rip off of "Texas Chainsaw Massacre" with the human flesh-leathery facial mask that the 'pervert' was wearing, it was so unnecessary, and it really brought the movie down a bit in originality. And finally I wasn't overly impressed with the death metal music in the movie. Yeah, I listen to metal myself every day, and nothing much aside from metal, but the metal music in this movie was so misplaced and out of touch with the rest of the movie, plus it just wasn't that great to listen to anyway.

Aside from these small irritations, then "Z108" was actually a good movie in itself, and a well worthy addition to the DVD collection of any zombie aficionado. And for it being Taiwan's first zombie movie, then way to go! Thumbs up.

This is a movie that many people probably won't like for a variety of reasons. First, the movie I watched was filmed in Taiwan with English subtitles. Now, normally subtitles wouldn't necessarily be a problem for me. However, the pace of the movie was very fast and jumped from one subplot to another with several different characters. This caused some confusion for me at first but as the movie continued it started to make sense. Additionally, it has some graphic sexual violence which some people may find distasteful. Be that as it may, the film essentially starts off with headlines explaining a recent virus in a laboratory and then we hear a car crash. Inside the car is a man named "Frank" who has been killed in the accident and an attractive young woman named "Linda" (Yvonne Yao). Upon regaining consciousness, she realizes that her 3-year old daughter, "Chloe" is missing. So she walks into a deserted supermarket and encounters zombies. She manages to escape with her daughter and is picked up by a passing motorist (played by the director, Joe Chien) who turns out to be a pervert of the worst kind. From there the scenario abruptly changes to one where the cops are trying to seal off "District 108" and then to a nightclub where an obese gangster (played by Morris Rong) is indulging himself with cocaine and naked women. Since I don't want to divulge the entire story I'll just add that other than the sexual violence it wasn't that bad. Especially considering it was a low-budget production. It had plenty of action and that was good because it helped to conceal the below average acting of everyone (with the possible exception of Yvonne Yao). All in all then it was an interesting film that some "zombie enthusiasts" might want to check out one day.

I love zombie movies, but it was hard to find good zombie movie from Asia. This one is good, but there is two thing which I want to share with you.

1-tipicle Chinese stile movie- mix of saw, rec, biohazard etc dressed up with new CG technique. No originality at for scenes.

2-subliminal anti japan propaganda- lot of money come from Chinese government so its normal, but lot of racism in Chinese language. I hate political indication in movies...

watch it if you like zombie movies, its good for spent 80min during weekend night(but don't spend money for rent)

Zombie108: A violent adult Zombie film, definitely not for the squeamish. Zombie virus outbreak in Taipei, police and army combat zombies but then come under attack from gang members. Theres even a serial killer who takes advantage of the situation. The film is somewhat confusing as the dialogue is in English, Mandarin and Japanese without subtitles but generally you can follow whats going on.

Diehard Zombie fans will like it.

I find it had to see why anyone has rated this film as anything above terrible.

I love zombie movies (usually) and I also really enjoy movies from outside the UK, especially Hong Kong Cinema. However this film was such a let down I find it hard to put into words.

I will start with the acting which is some of the worst I have seen in any movie, even the Zombies are acted badly! Secondly The camera work is all over the place to the point that it makes the viewer feel dazed and loose concentration.

The story is poor taste and seems to just look for excuses for nudity. The film tries to shock and fails terribly. The whole film is patchy and seems to be really badly put together jumping from scene to scene often lacking in sense and direction.

My conclusion: Save an hour and a half of your life and skip this one.