Zombies of the Living Dead (2015)

I did it again. I was poking around the internet… this time Tubi TV… and found an independent zombie movie. Somehow I haven’t learned my lesson and thought to myself “how bad could this be?” Well my friends it could be very bad indeed.

There is a cop telling us what is happening in a voiceover. There is a science guy in his garage who figures out how to revive the dead using radio waves. This causes a zombie apocalypse and then the credits roll. Then we see a parking lot which is an establishing shot of a guy sitting in a cubicle… I mean radio station broadcasting about poodles being aliens. What the hell does this have to do with anything? Nothing at all. Then we are treated to a bunch of local businesses in establishing shots. Then some random attacks with characters that aren’t really characters as they appear long enough to die without ever being given names. Cool, I guess.

All the above happened at night. Then it is daylight and zombies are shuffling in front of the camera while folks are going about their business in the background. I mean couldn’t you have at least framed the scene so we don’t see someone loading groceries into their car during the apocalypse? I guess that was too much effort. Fifteen minutes in we finally meet our main character, the cop who has been narrating, as he bumps into and flirts with a girl named Mary. Some random shit happens while generic rock music blares over the dialogue. They run into some survivors, figure out that it is radio signals, go to the garage and unplug the equipment. Then inexplicably we find out that didn’t work and that the survivors are making a training video on how to survive.

I have to stop watching these movies. Clocking in a barely an hour long this movie clearly doesn’t have a script or any idea of what the story is supposed to be. It has the choppy feeling of something pieced together from random bits shot on various weekends until they could get it long enough to get away with charging people for it. Think about it we don’t even meet the main character or get to his story until a quarter of the movie, which is again an hour long, is over! It isn’t like that time is used to set the narrative up either. It is nothing but random characters getting attacked. After we meet the cop the rest of the movie is him and the others getting attacked at random locations. Really there is nothing going on here at all.

The special effects work is terrible. You get lots of CGI for the kills including the bane of low budget horror the fake blood on the screen effect as if it was sprayed on the backside of the television. Guys really this is just a dumb effect that never works. The zombies border from cheap ass white makeup from the costume shop to even worse plastic masks. Other technical bits to point out are the already blaring generic music, plastic cap guns as props, and audio that drops in and out during dialogue making it impossible to hear what the cast is saying. Though based on the lack of script I’m thinking that isn’t necessarily a bad thing. Finally, there is a drive-in scene that looks like someone had a twenty year old copy of iMovie and a green screen. It is terrible.

I’ve been doing this long enough to know what some of you are already thinking to yourself. ‘John this is a low budget movie. Cut them some slack.’ Well first thing they are charging money so when you want people’s hard earned cash then you had better put some effort into your project. Second, and I’ll never stop beating this dead horse, make sure you have a story/script before grabbing the camera. A lack of budget is no excuse not to have a script ready to go. Not only that but make sure you have the resources to shoot whatever story you have on paper and if you don’t (the drive-in scene) then move off of it and go for something you can do. I also understand that this might have been going for laughs. Well nowhere the movie is listed is it categorized as a comedy and more importantly it isn’t funny.

Zombies of the Living Dead is a terrible movie and a prime example of someone tossing some crap at the wall and calling it a zombie flick. I don’t know why folks keep making these. I suppose there is some money to be made selling them. I mean I keep watching. Please don’t make the same mistake and stay far away from this turkey.

 

© Copyright 2023 John Shatzer