 Return of the Living Dead (1985) Dan O'Bannon, who wrote Alien and Total Recall as well as Blue Thunder and Lifeforce, directed this more-spoof-than-sequel to Night of the Living Dead, and it's hard to tell whether he knew what the hell he was doing. Certainly given his seemingly random filmography, it may be that he was simply throwing shit at the wall to see what stuck. Fortunately, lots and lots of shit sticks to the walls on this one. The rather ingenious setup has a medical supply warehouse worker spooking his new employee with a tale of how the zombies in Night of the Living Dead were actually real, and not only that, but they're in the basement, locked up in high-security military-made receptacles. Of course, they venture into the basement and open one of the receptacles, which instantly releases a gas that animates all the cadavers in the building. After subduing these initial zombies, the warehouse workers go over to the nearby mortuary to cremate the still-moving body parts. Unfortunately, this error in judgment actually creates a worse problem, as the billowing smoke from the chimney mixes with clouds overhead to produce an acid rain that pours down over the nearby cemetery. And in that cemetery is a disjointed group of punk teens, who are partying there. The rain causes all the buried bodies to rise up and attack everyone they encounter, because, as we find out, eating brains is the only thing that can reduce the pain of being dead. The sheer number of zombies is completely hilarious, especially as they kill of parimedics and policemen, then use the car radios to have dispatchers send more parimedics and cops, so that they can have more brains. The gang of punks immediately turns into zombiefood, as they are chased down one by one and their brains eaten. In the funniest sequence, two replacement parimedics arrive, observed by the remaining humans with anticipation of resuce, and upon exiting their ambulance, they are descended upon by about three dozen zombies, much to the horrified disappointment of the survivors barricaded inside.
The pace is fast, the music loud, the gore factor high, the humor outrageous, and the morality nonexistent. The ending brings what is already fever-pitched death and destruction to the point of absolute nihilism. It's exactly the kind of movie Ed Wood would have killed (or eaten brains) to make. Curiously, for all its evident hipness, the DVD commentary track reveals the filmmakers to be quite serious about Return of the Living Dead, almost as though they were, in fact, trying to make a great zombie movie, and were disappointed with how it came out. So perhaps the appeal of this film is in the eye of the beholder. Personally, I find it far too intentionally raucous to be "so bad it's good" – rather, it's a work of unheard-of audacity (especially since O'Bannon did not even have the rights to make a sequel to the original film). Endlessly watchable, always remarkable, and in a class of its own … Return of the Living Dead can not be rated on any conventional scale. I therefore award it Seven Zombie George Brett Heads.
Review by La Fée |
