Grave Halloween and Zombie Night spook out SyFy!
Our good friends at SyFy (SciFi Channel for all you retronauts!) are bringing us some more original movie premieres that will blow. Your mind. Maybe.
Saturday October 19th brings us Grave Halloween!
An American college student studying in Japan risks her own life to save the spirit of her dead mother who killed herself in the notorious real-life Suicide Forest. Grave Halloween stars Cassie Thomson (Big Love) and Graham Wardle (Supernatural).
Grave Halloween was originally known as The Last Halloween, but not any more! Check out the IMDB for proof. This synopsis is all we know so far about Grave Halloween. I do notice they didn’t mention Kaitlyn Leeb, aka the three-breasted hooker from the remake of Total Recall. I wonder why… There is a large Asian cast, unusual for a SyFy flick, but welcome, even though the main characters don’t seem to be Asian.
Next up is Zombie Night on Saturday, October 26th.
Two families in a small American town face off against zombies in a long night of horror, torn between helping each other and saving themselves. Zombie Night stars Darryl Hannah (Kill Bill), Anthony Michael Hall (The Breakfast Club) and Shirley Jones (The Partridge Family).
Why does that press release not mention Alan Ruck is also in Zombie Night? He’s Cameron, for crying out loud! More info on the IMDB, where you can see the amazing cast for this film. The director is John Gulager, director of Piranha 3DD.
Both films are part of the “31 Days of Halloween” Scare-a-Thon, so be scared or some SyFy exec will get fired.
There are no images to go along with this press release, so enjoy this photo of a Sexy Sea Turtle costume from Yandy.com, guaranteed to be culturally more terrifying than either of these films!
Categories: Movie News Tags: Alan Ruck, Anthony Michael Hall, Darryl Hannah, Grave Halloween, Last Halloween, SciFi Channel, Shirley Jones, SyFy, Too many damn zombie movies
Beware the Zombeavers!
The beaver shot takes on new dimensions in the 21st Century…
Zombeavers is one of those titles you throw out when dropping potential SyFy channel puns, but now it’s going to be a real film. Comedian turned writer/director Jordan Rubin made a concept trailer edited out of other horror films and nature documentaries, which proved effective enough to score up some funding of his own for Zombeavers. The under $2 million budget allows for flexibility on how to distribute, but don’t fret, first they’re going to try the traditional market with Sundance and SXSW screening attempts to shore up interest. Even if that doesn’t pan out, the budget is low enough they could probably make most of it back via the traditional markets for films like SyFy and international distribution.
Zombeavers has what it suggest, zombie beavers that got a knack for devouring a bunch of teens and teen-like humans. Bill Burr and Cortney Palm are listed on the IMDB as some of the stars, though no idea how big their roles are.
Tagline? “Next summer, you will all be dammed.”
Time via DreadCentral
Categories: Movie News Tags: Bill Burr, Cortney Palm, Jordan Rubin, Too many damn zombie movies, Zombeavers
Dead Sushi
Dead Sushi
aka デッド寿司 aka Deddo Sushi
2012
Written by Noboru Iguchi, Makiko Iguchi, and Jun Tsugita
Directed by Noboru Iguchi
Summing up Dead Sushi in one picture!
Dead Sushi combines two of my favorite things from low budget Japanese cinema – Rina Takeda and Noboru Iguchi! While I wish these two combined to make something amazing, Dead Sushi turns out to just be above average. While certainly a lot better than either of the prior Iguchi and Takeda films I have seen (Zombie Ass and Kunoichi), Dead Sushi suffers from trying to be too many things. Sure, it’s got zombies, killer sushi, and face kicking, but there is also a big lecture on the proper way to make, eat, and appreciate sushi. Dead Sushi takes as much from Jiro Dreams of Sushi as it does from Machine Girl or High-Kick Girl! Unfortunately, they drag the movie down to a more average range.
Finally a movie that isn’t afraid to spit the truth!
The two main attractions to Dead Sushi are the gore effects and the choreography. First – the gore effects are okay, but not so different from what we’ve seen before. The humor comes from the instigators of this gore, living sushi pieces that talk gibberish and fly through the air, skeletonizing people. After the gimmick wears off, Dead Sushi gives us zombies to allow for some actual fighting against something other than CGI and puppets. While zombies are overused and boring (despite these zombies spitting up rice!), the occasional fights against CGI sushi have their fun, and remind me of Birdemic.
Why you should never eat cheap take-out rice!
The choreography is less disappointing, and is what you should seek out Dead Sushi for. Rina Takeda’s Keiko is a sushi apprentice to her father, the sushi chef skills giving her karate skills because that’s just how it works. There is some kicking and punching of sushi pieces out of the air, and later some battles against ineffectual zombies. Dead Sushi then shakes things up with Kentaro Shimazu running around with a giant fish head and a gianter axe to battle Rina Takeda, while the one good piece of sushi – Eggy – does battle with a giant CGI sushi battleship. The fights keep you entertained, whoever the stunt guy for Kentaro Shimazu is matches well with Rina Takeda’s moves, giving us nice fighting to entertain the people. Bread and circuses. Or Sushi and Zombies.
Shaming the shameless
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Better than the movie Battleship!
Read more…
Day of the Dead gets another remake
Day of the Dead has one of the most interesting trajectories in the Zombie Canon. The original 1985 film from George Romero didn’t exactly set box offices afire, and the 2005 sequel in name only Day of the Dead 2: Contagium is one of the least fondly remembered horror films in history. That was briefly challenged by the 2008 remake of Day of the Dead, which took the name and nothing else for it’s ridiculous story starring Nick Cannon and Mena Suvari (and Ving Rhames, who sadly was not playing the brother of his Dawn of the Dead remake character!) There is also a comic prequel, which is the only media related to Day of the Dead I’ve heard people say good things about besides the original film.
But 2008 was so long ago, it’s time to revisit the story of Day of the Dead, or at least make more sweet sweet $$$$ off of the name recognition now that World War Z somehow didn’t bomb. Enter the producers of the Texas Chainsaw Massacre 3D, Lati Grobman and Christa Campbell, who are out to proof that they are the new faces of horror. Thus they want to create a film that is more like the original and less like World War Z. Which is an odd comparison to make, but okay, sure, whatever. Christa Campbell was even in the 2008 remake of Day of the Dead. Because this can’t get any weirder. Luckily, they are keeping the budget at $10-20 million, which should be enough to get a return even if it does terrible.
Forget that, I’ll just eat some Zombie Star Trek Captain Cookies.
Categories: Movie News Tags: Christa Campbell, George Romero, Lati Grobman, Remakes are stupid, Too many damn zombie movies
Zombie Ass: Toilet of the Dead
Zombie Ass: Toilet of the Dead
aka ゾンビアス Zonbiasu
2011
Written by Noboru Iguchi, Ao Murata, and Jun Tsugita
Story by Tadayoshi Kubo
Directed by Noboru Iguchi
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The horrible secret of Bush’s Baked Beans…
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While normally a fan of the Japanese ultra-gore films and Noboru Iguchin in general, Zombie Ass: Toilet of the Dead ends up sucking ass! What is should be a bunch of fun and ridiculous scenes instead gets bogged down by far too much melodrama, and the replacement of poo for the blood splatter scenes. Which isn’t done in a creative way, and instead rely on the fact that there is lots of poo around for the laughs. Poo may be funny in concept, but in practice it gets boring really fast. While other films like Helldriver and Mutant Girls Squad mix their films with a greater theme, Zombie Ass fails to successfully do that, either. There is a vague theme of bullying that rarely comes in to play, and doesn’t parallel with the zombie tapeworm invasion tale going on. The obvious subtext of body image is barely addressed and would have resulted in a much better film. The ending battle with a flying girl versus a monster is nothing we haven’t seen before, either. It took four people to write something so bland!
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Funnily enough, this method of transportation has begun to catch on in crowded Tokyo
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Zombie Ass‘s few pluses include the design of the tapeworm parasites, they have a brain on them that make them look like the creatures from Fiend Without a Face. I do not know how intentional this homage is, but I hope it was very. I will also score a point for the final monster looking like a sock puppet Jar Jar Binks, because that effect is bad enough it became funny. But besides that, I do not need a heroine who is sad all the time because she didn’t bother to save her bullied sister, nor every other character either being horrible or dating someone horrible. Most of the cast are the type of people who die first or second in a movie, and it was annoying seeing them continue to live beyond their expiration date. I was rooting for the poo to drown them!
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Meesa mutant butt zombie, okeyday!
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Even the appearance by regulars Asami Sugiura, Demo Tanaka, Yuya Ishikawa, and gratuitous nudity don’t save Zombie Ass from going down the drain. You’re gonna want to flush this load as soon as it’s dropped off at the pool. This film doesn’t have much to go on, and this is no smear campaign. Zombie Ass could be more Charmin, and that’s the bottom line. Despite the brown-nosing, Zombie Ass is only a #2. You might want to log off now, these puns sure are on a roll!
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Okay, Star Wars Prequel Abomination, I got the cure!
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Break out the folding chairs of the dead for Pro-Wrestlers vs Zombies!
Pro-Wrestlers vs. Zombies was funded through Kickstarter last year and has proceeded to the point where trailers are showing up.
The film features a number of popular wrestler entertainers playing themselves during a zombie apocalypse that goes down. This basically means we get to see wrestlers wrestle zombies in the ring. So if you are a wrasslin’ fan or a zombie fan, then you will be interested. If you are both, you will be very interested. If you are neither, you may still be interested because this is rather odd and maybe it will be cool.
Pro-Wrestlers vs Zombies is written and directed by Cody Knotts, and features Rowdy Roddy Piper, Shane Douglas, Hacksaw Jim Duggan, Matt Hardy, Kurt Angle, Reby Sky, and Tara Parker. And zombies. Lots of zombies.
Categories: Movie News Tags: Hacksaw Jim Duggan, Kurt Angle, Matt Hardy, Reby Sky, Rowdy Roddy Piper, Shane Douglas, Tara Parker, Too many damn zombie movies
