Exit Humanity Review

“Exit Humanity” (2011) was a nice departure from the usual zombie flick as of late, by far a great example of cinema and not just a movie.

Told with use of a narrator, the movie focuses on the reading of an old journal written by a Civil War soldier, named Edward Young, that describes the now zombie filled world a decade after the end of the war.

What starts out as one mans quest to live contently with his wife and son in the countryside turns into something he’d never have imagined. With his wife and son dead, both zombies who were mercifully put down by his own hands, he treks out alone headed towards the one place he might find some peace, a place he never got the chance to take his son to when he was alive.

But the journey is put on hold as a chance meeting with Isaac, a fellow soldier, recruits his help to save his sister, Emma, from a gang of rebel military men who have taken to kidnapping survivors and exposing them to zombie bites in the hope to find a cure. Edward’s descent into madness (and his constant yelling) takes a turn when Emma is found to be immune to the scourge, having been bitten a few weeks prior with no side effects, and the initial cause of the entire zombie apocalypse is discovered. Soon the General and his men come for them, for the cure and for  justice.

Mark Gibson does a great job for his first major role in portraying a family man who has lost everything to the scourge. It is solely the narration that tops him, with Brian Cox’s haunting voice really bringing in the emotion to the film, especially when combined with its amazing soundtrack. Isaac (Adam Seybold) and his sister Emma (Jordan Hayes) along with the accused witch Eve (Dee Wallace) round out Edward’s new family and help him reclaim a reason for living.

The photography is beautiful, purposely bleached out to create this eerie period piece. Animation is used in a few scenes to hurry along the already lengthy story’s progression which adds a nice flare to the entire package. Even the zombie makeup isn’t too bad, with the director having no qualms about showing them in full sunlight and not just under cover of darkness.

Mark Gibson in 2011′s “Exit Humanity”

If your idea of a good zombie flick comprise wall to wall zombies, brain splatters, and endless running and shooting, this is not the movie for you. Storytelling and emotion are the main focus (see “YellowBrickRoad” for another great example), while sorrow and heartbreak keep the number of feel good moments to the bare minimum. If there is a con to this movie it’s the journal itself. Its presence throughout almost reveals the ending ahead of time, making you less fearful for something to happen to our mighty protagonist.

Overall, I enjoyed “Exit Humanity” tremendously, it is a definite re-watch for me. I don’t know that I would rank it as high as some of the other films reviewed here at ӔHorror, but it’s still a great film.

With “Special Thanks To All The zombies.” (Listed in the credits of the f ilm.)

The Ghost Galleon Review

‘The Ghost Galleon’ (1974) is the third movie in Amando de Ossorio’s Blind Dead series and almost stands up to the previous entries. I reviewed the first movie, ‘Tombs of the Blind Dead’ last May (read that review here) and so was glad to have the opportunity to watch this third installment.

In ‘Horror of the Zombies’ (as this movie is called on various public domain DVD’s) the basic story is a publicity stunt lands two bikini clad models out in the middle of the ocean “stranded” in a boat. The thought is that they would be found by another ship and the rescuing would make headlines. But instead of being found by someone capable of starting this mediafire they are stumbled upon by an ancient galleon carrying the undead Knights Templar. After being struck by the galleon and surrounded by an impenetrable fog the ladies make their way on board this seemingly empty ship in order to try to get some answers.

After the duo is not heard from for quite some time, their employers and friends go out in search of them using their last known coordinates as a guide. They find favorable waters and no boat nor galleon, that is until a strange fog starts to encroach upon them. The rest of the story pretty much tells itself.

Like the first Blind Dead movie, the undead in ‘The Ghost Galleon’ are probably some of the most amazing looking zombies around, albeit as slow as frozen molasses when it comes to their movement speed. When they are onscreen Amando does something that only works in a few films…there is no danger music, no sound at all except from what you see on screen. Dead silence interrupted by floor boards creaking, screams and groans, footfalls shuffling and nothing else. There are definitely some eerie scenes in this movie because of it and I loved every one of them, they are what make the movie.

But for its pro’s, it has some con’s too. For one it’s dubbed (at least the version that I watched). As filmed, ‘The Ghost Galleon’ is a Spanish film and so it is dubbed in English, and some of the female voices used are a bit too masculine to match the women on screen. Also there are more than a few scenes that have a good amount of overacting.

The biggest con is a strong point for me for why I like this film but one that I think the majority of horror fans won’t get into. The buildup is slow as is the pace. It’s 33 minutes into the film before you catch a glimpse of the first undead and it takes an additional 2 or 3 minutes before he manages to drag his slow moving carcass out of his coffin and get moving. I enjoy that style of cinematography, where the action and gore is not a strongpoint but replaced with tension and creepiness (not that I don’t enjoy a good dismemberment either, don’t get me wrong). One scene where the Knights are attacking Barbara Rey’s character takes way too many minutes for what little it contains, which is that the Knights drag her down into the bowels of the ship. It ‘feels’ like ten minutes for something so simple when there are five Knights all working together and what a normal zombie would have had finished in thirty seconds. You either enjoy that type of scene or not and this movie has a lot of them.

Blanca Estrada probably gives the best performance here as Kathy, one of the two missing models, as well as Carlos Lemos, a Professor who’s interested in the mysterious galleon and its legend. With no main star to speak of, each character has to hold its own and most fail at it.

In the end this movie does not compare all that well to ‘Tombs of the Blind Dead’ and if it had come out first, I probably would not have rushed to see the others. However, riding on the coattails of the previous films and containing the awesome undead Knights Templar, silly plot or no silly plot, this movie garners at least a single viewing. It is embedded below for those willing.

Dead Snow Review

What do Nazi’s, zombies, Edvard Grieg’s ‘In The Hall of the Mountain King’, intestinal rope and 450 liters of blood all have in common? They all appear in the 2009 movie ‘Dead Snow’! Let me start out by saying this movie is definitely fun. Unfortunately, despite having Nazi zombies in it, it is not all that fun. But that notwithstanding, let’s look at the film.

‘Dead Snow’, despite it being in Norwegian and requiring the use of subtitles, is an excellent zombie film. Somewhat likeable characters, the obligatory old guy who warms the younger crowd of the danger they are (who dies later in the film), the bathroom and sex scene, decapitations, chainsaws and the like, and almost intelligent Nazi zombies comprise the majority of this film. What isn’t there to love? The resident movie geek even knows how precarious a situation they see themselves in wandering off into a cabin in the deep forest with no cell phone reception and no way to reach help easily.

To further explain the story, a group of medical students take an Easter break vacation up into a remote cabin in the snow covered mountains of Norway. Little do they know this cabin is the hiding spot of a box of gold coins, necklaces and the like that, back in World War II, a group of Nazi’s maliciously took from villagers and later died trying to keep. Naturally, being many years later, these now zombie Nazi’s are looking for their gold and are willing to do whatever it takes to get it back.

The movie takes some time to explain the story, have the first sighting of whatever is in the woods, introduce the old guy who tells them they should leave and have the box of gold found so expect not to have much happen for just over half an hour. However, once it starts, watch out!

Whereas the first half of the film you might mistake for an actual attempt at a suspenseful horror film the second half of this film is definitely your typical zombie comedy: a lot of over the top blood-n-guts scenes, hilarious (and typical) cliché humor and zombies popping out of everywhere in a never-ending supply of ruthlessness. I definitely enjoyed the second half more than the first as I assume most will.

The snow covered countryside is shot well enough and really adds to the film and to the imposed isolation they characters find themselves in. Also, despite that you neither love nor hate any character more than the others, (unlike most horror films with those you definitely want to see killed versus those you want to survive) as some get killed off the remaining do about what is expected of them to try to survive the onslaught making it at least halfway reasonable as far as believability goes. The ‘two men against the world’ standoff near the end is one of the best scenes in the entirety.

I can’t give credit to any one actor over another, honestly no one stood out over anyone else. The zombies, the countryside, the gore and the story itself are the shining stars of this film. It is a definitely worth a watch, maybe even twice. However I’d save the purchase for something a little more memorable long term. The scenes that mirror other movies are too numerous for it to stand on its own, which I think is by design unfortunately.

Tombs of the Blind Dead Review

It is not unlike me to watch a subtitled foreign film. In fact, one of my favorite films ever is Run Lola Run, a German film subtitled in English (the English dub version is just horrible and ruins the movie, skip if you can) starring Franka Potente.

It can be hard to find a good foreign horror film at times when the mood for one hits; they are either before my time or just never show up in top 10 lists of foreign films anywhere for me to come across. That being said, I was very glad to come across the Spanish language Blind Dead tetralogy just by chance.

The first installment of this series is entitled ‘Tombs of the Blind Dead’, written and directed by Amando de Ossorio in 1971. Originally called ‘La Noche del terror ciego’(‘The Night of the Blind Terror’), this film focuses on the Knights Templar (only referred to as Knights of the East in the film, yet they wear the Templar uniform), a real-life order who were charged with witchcraft and executed. They were left hanging on the gallows so birds could peck out their eyes and their corpses eventually return to life when anyone dares venture into their abandoned village and monastery of Berzano after dark.

The plot is that Virginia, Betty, and Roger decide to take a vacation by train. Enroute, Virginia, sensing interest between Betty, her long time best friend, and Roger, her boyfriend, and having seen a village outside the train window, jumps off the moving train to have some time alone. She attempts to spend the night in the village, only to have the knights awaken and come after her, killing her. Later, Betty and Roger, after arriving at their destination, rent some horses to go back to the village to try tofind Virginia. Like the knights, Virginia’s corpse soon starts walking as well, out on the hunt of humans.

As the story continues, Betty and Roger go to a librarian to learn of the knights, finding out at the librarians brother, Pedro, is a smuggler in the area of Berzano. It is thought that Pedro could be using the knight legend to cover his activities, hiding from prying eyes. After going to see him, Betty and Roger manage to convince him to go with them to Berzano, to spend the night there in hope of finding out what happened to Virginia. Soon, the church bells sound and the knights awaken once again, closing in.

The knights look very much like out of a Tolkien novel, arms outstretched, slow to walk, but able to ride ghostly horses. Even Virginia walks at a slow pace. These are not your fast moving primal zombies (the director didn’t even like them being referred to as zombies, but rather that they resembled mummies). Blind, they hunt by sound and can follow anything making noise, including heartbeats. The wonderful soundtrack is by Antón García Abril, showcasing well placed screams, groans, creepy music, and Templar chanting to do wonders to add to the atmosphere of the abandoned village from a long time ago. The ghostly horses footsteps are shown in slow motion and have a nice echo to them in the still air. The Spanish women and countryside also add to the visual appeal of the movie.

Most of the time the subtitles stand out and are easy to read, I counted only a handful of scenes where this was not the case, where the background color blended in with the subtitle color washing them out. That aside, however, subtitles also means that non-native speakers miss a lot of the nuances of the actors expressions and body language while they are speaking on screen. Despite this, María Elena Arpón (Virginia) and José Thelman (Pedro) come across as very charismatic, they have a good screen presence, and are memorable characters. Francisco Sanz as Prof. Candel (the librarian) is well cast, his look is the stereotypical scholarly type role with the glasses and peppered hair and goatee, and he’s instrumental in explaining the background story of the knights to both Betty and Roger as well as the viewers.

If terror build up (as opposed to in your face destruction and gore) and nice cinematography interest you, this is definitely a film worthy of a viewing or two, if not a place on your shelf. Eurohorror at its finest.