twilight_speaks

I pretty much watch all horror movies voraciously, and I LIKE my torture porn - right along with my psychological thrillers and good, old-fashioned slasher/monster flicks. With the recent lines of Saw and Hostel setting the bar for outrageous gore effects fairly high, I'm not surprised to see the lower budget movies struggling to keep up with the trend. Gag does use what budget it has effectively enough in its gore shots. They didn't skimp on the blood, and while some of the stunts were ridiculous, I'm not entirely sure they weren't intended to be.

It's a watchable film, but it drags. The writing and delivery of lines were often amateurish, which made the dialogue difficult to sit through at times. Had the death and torture sequences been more outrageous, it could have been truly shocking. Had they been a little more ridiculous, it could have been horrifyingly funny. Had they hired a different script writer, it might even have been clever. The end result is a sloppy movie that lacks commitment to be anything other than another low-budget fright flick with lofty ambitions and no follow-through. Worth a rental for genre fans, certainly, but not really worth a movie theater ticket - even at the matinée price. I'm not surprised it didn't get a general release.

Yes, there are better zombie movies out there. However, there are also much, much worse. Graveyard Alive has a lot of heart and humor behind it, which sells it despite its shortcomings and sets it apart within the genre. Keeping in mind that the budget for this movie was very small, the money was spent where it should have been - on actors and actresses who primarily worked in stage productions and had a strong control of their expressions, on securing a real hospital as a set, and on a decent technical crew. The editing and cinematography are actually pretty pro, and when your genre is so infested with hand-held camcorder affairs in backyard fields, you appreciate a good sense of lighting and photography.

The movie is also notable for the fact that the zombie starlet is your main, sympathetic character - something we don't often see done with zombies, even zombie comedies (and this movie was not intended to scare you, so if you're looking for a frightfest you really should have looked more closely at the description). You find yourself rooting for her transformation, and you want her to succeed - if only so that you can see what she does next.

It's campy, flawed, and I strongly recommend it -- especially to genre fans who have seen one too many disappointing, cookie-cutter low-budget zombie movie in the hopes of catching something different. This is definitely different, and definitely worth a watch. And don't be afraid to smile at the overacting and odd, sparse dialogue - you're Supposed to.