Hsien of the Dead

I'm not very familiar with Singaporean cinema, after a quick check it seems like I may have only ever seen one single film before and I wasn't a fan of it.

Now in 2012 we had The Zombinator which I class as the worst zombie movie ever made, well the same year we had this. Zombinator actually has competition.

To its credit Hsien Of The Dead doesn't take itself seriously, from effects to acting to story it's all a comedy but the trouble is its simply not even remotely funny.

Full of stupid attempts at jokes, dreadful everything and actors who barely manage to get their English dialogue out I can't put into words quite how bad this was.

I adore the zombie sub-genre and it works so well with comedy but this failed on every front. One single scene in the entire film made me laugh but I found myself ashamed that I have as it was incredibly childish humour.

Hsien Of The Dead is the absolute pits, it looks and sounds terrible yet cost over quarter of a million dollars to create.

Maybe this is why I'm not familiar with Singaporean cinema, and have no desire to become better acquainted.

The Good:

Interrogation scene was embarrassingly hilarious

The Bad:

Soundtrack gets real old real fast

Audio quality is awful

Actors English is really quite poor

Just plain dumb

Things I Learnt From This Movie:

Singaporean cinema should come with a warning label

Clearly this is the best Singapore zombie movie of 2012.

The trailer at the start is reminiscent of a Monty Python sketch and is obviously a tip-of-the- hat to that sort of humor. Hsien of the Dead is simply a ground-breaking revolution in digital filmmaking, and throughout most of it, uses many interesting roving shots and angles. Writer-Director-Producer Gary Ow did an absolute bang-up job on his first feature. Kudos to him.

To appreciate this film, you must compare it with any of Lloyd Kaufmann's films, employs the "sorta" B-grade story-over-quality thing that happens in Hsien of the Dead. The plot is quite simple: Singapore has a slow zombie apocalypse unveiling as a virus starts infecting the population. Four survivors meet up and attempt to escape from Singapore island.

Opening with a music video that has nothing to do with the story, except introduce the cast, the movie opens with 4 separate Origin Stories, very much in a style of a comic book, very choppy, very frenetic in nature.

Ah Huay (Vivienne Tseng) is the alpha-female, cos-play blade-fighter. Edward (Ernest Seah) the boot-licking censor is from the Ministry of Propaganda's censor board civil-servant who watches porn all day. Hana (Nurhuda Choo) is the crack-shot tudung-wearing biker-chick. Hsien (Moses San Juan) is the Singapore army conscript.

What I enjoyed about this was the portrayal of Singapore's army as a lackadaisical spineless force: their weapons are all kept unlocked. Anyone who has served time in the Singapore army can probably attest to their low levels of security.

The Terrorist is Mas Alamak (Darrell Britt), a parody of the terrorist from real life. The interrogation scene in the movie is probably the best funniest bit in the whole movie.

Hsien of the Dead is the funniest Singapore zombie movie ever made. This is 72 minutes of pure unadulterated laughter. Highly recommended.