Day Of The Dead 2: Contagium (2005)

"Mom? What's for breakfast! Chewties?! What a perfect way to begin the day!"

Genre: Horror Drama

Starring: Laurie Baranyay, Steve Colosi

Directed By: Ana Clavell (Chick Street Fighter, Creepshow 3), James Glenn Dudelson (Horror 101, Creepshow 3)

Overview: A once contained viral outbreak has resurfaced in a mental hospital forty years later. Amidst contagion, the first infected try to keep their wits about themselves while their instincts to feast on flesh grows.

Acting: The first thing I noticed was this: when you have people in your movie, instead of having them act like they're running away, actually HAVE THEM running away. I don't know what it is with the lens that turns people into complete morons. Three times I mentioned how forced it looked, though it was certainly worth a good laugh. From the main cast I was pleasantly surprised at the fact that they could act their way out of a paper bag.
Rating: 5

Cinematography: It's interesting how when a film starts with a hospital full of zombies getting mowed down by army personnel with close-ups of bulletshots to the head, people tend to sit quietly and enjoy. Gore is great. This is full of it and the bodycount is high, thank you very much. No there's no great variety of different kinds of death but the camerawork is professional and the special effects are decent. You can ask for high art but I didn't, and though not a trend-setter, there's zombies, lots of 'em, and that's why you rented a zombie movie, right?
Rating: 7

Script: One orderly is written purely for the sake of being the target for the worst punishment ever, since he's the biggest dick you ever met. There's the quirky, funny, 'cares for his patients' doctor and the issues he has with the 'you're too personal' naysaying chief of the hospital. You have love interests and a tightly-knit group of patient-friends, adding up to the realization that there was definitely an effort at giving all these characters dimension. Unfortunately when the first draft was completed, rather than polishing it up, the writers probably spent the rest of their time looking over at the props department and drooling over all the latex and corn syrup.
Rating: 5

Plot: I liked the idea that original 'Living Dead' trilogy director Romero left the why and how the dead are coming back to life rather open. Rumours of a comet or a contagion were only suggested by offshooting tribute films. I guess you could say that this is also one of those, even though Romero's original title is all over this. I don't think I like the idea that zombies are definitely an alien infection. That aside, the way this film unfolds is a touch too much explanation and though full of gore, still has too much yappin' between bloodlettings. At least the characters have an idea of what's going on and what to do and there's a real ending. That's gotta count for something.
Rating: 5

Mood: 9 million dollar budget. It hurts thinking about how quickly all that money was pissed away, I know, and though this film serves nothing to enhance the Romero culture or the zombie culture, this is at least entertaining enough to watch with your friends, have a couple beers and laugh, which is all about the B-Genre Horror subculture. You won't be wowed, but Jesus Christ, where you seriously expecting that?!
Rating: 5

Well, you gotta give 'em this much... EWWWWW

Overall Rating: 54% (Uh, It Looks A Little Infected)

Aftertaste: So yeah, this isn't a good movie, however it is a great B-Horror movie day option. If you're the kind of horror fan who needs to find the rare gore flick that no one else has already heard of... then you won't see this because you're reading my review proving that it's not that rare, and you'd rather give something else a chance. So uh.. go do that. What did I learn from this day's triple-feature? That I proudly bring the worst horror movies to the rental counter and talk about them with the staff, compared to the terror I would feel if anyone ever caught me renting something like Failure To Launch.