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Year: 1979
Rating: R
Running Time: 1 hour, 31 minutes
A woman named Anne and a reporter named Peter West look for Anne's missing father when his boat turns up in New York under mysterious circumstances. It leads them and two strangers to a small island in the Caribbean that is overrun by zombies.
Did you know that despite this film being titled "Zombi 2" in many regions, there is no "Zombi 1"? "Zombi 2," aka "Zombie," is directed by acclaimed horror director Lucio Fulci, who has helmed other horror films like "The Beyond," "The House by the Cemetery" and "City of Living Dead." It is written by Elisa Briganti, who wrote horror movies like "A Blade in the Dark," and actually worked with Fulci previously on "The House by the Cemetery." When a ghost ship drifts into the New York harbor, the Coast Guard investigates and discovers one passenger on board who happens to be an undead man who eats one of the unsuspecting officers. A reporter named Peter West (Ian McCulloch) is asked to investigate this incident as the paper believes the police aren't telling the whole story. Peter meets a woman named Anne Bowles (Tisa Farrow), whose father owns the boat but has been missing for months since he went to do research on an island in the Carribean called Matul. Peter and Anne hitch a ride to Matul on a boat owned by a couple named Brian (Al Cliver) and Susan (Auretta Gay), who are cruising in that direction. When they get to Matul, they find it overrun by the undead and now must fight to escape the island with their lives.
This is the second Lucio Fulci-directed film we have reviewed this Halloween season, and one thing is abundantly clear to us: Fulci really, really likes his gratuitously violent and bloody gore effects. Who can blame him when they are so amazing?! Watching zombies rip flesh from the bone with their teeth as deep red blood comes pouring from wounds like a faucet, or seeing a broken piece of wood being slowly forced through someone's eye socket...it makes us shudders just thinking about it. These effects may be a little dated, but damn it, they are brilliant, and they are still just as effective now as they were decades ago. They still look pretty good even though they are not always realistic. As far as the story goes, the narrative is pretty thin, as are the characters within the story. There are plenty of contrived plot points just to be sure as many people come in contact with the undead as possible. It's also a little annoying that so many of the female characters just sit there and stare with dumbfounded looks on their faces as zombies very, very slowly saunter over to them before grabbing them and taking a bite of their necks. This happens on more than one occasion and it's plain ol' silly. The men usually fight back, but not the helpless, hapless women. That being said, there is also a scene where a zombie fights a shark! This scene is shot underwater, with a real shark, and a real performer in full zombie makeup....so....really....we think we can put our criticisms on the back-burner this one time.
Everything in "Zombie"/"Zombi 2" is pretty awesome, but the shark scene makes this cult horror worth watching. C'mon...who needs layered characters and an intricate story when you have a zombie fighting a shark!?
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| "I'm just scared that we're never going to make it off this island." (Image Source) |
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| "They're coming back to life. They're everywhere!" (Image Source) |
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| "What is all this about the dead coming back to life again and... having to be killed a second time? I mean, what the hell's going on here?" (Image Source) |
BigJ's Rating: 7/10
IMDB's Rating: 6.9/10
RT Rating: 42%
Do we recommend this movie: Sure, why not?
Italian zombie movie makers don't rely on good script or acting but on voluminous amount of gore and violence as evidenced by this movie.
ReplyDeleteHONESTLY I FOUND SOME PARTS HILARIOUS.SOME ZOMBIES WERE LITERALLY HISSING LIKE SNAKES 🐍,THE ONES STALKING MRS MENARD.
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