After Death (Oltre la morte)

First of all, let me clear the confusion on the Zombie series, because people are seeing Zombie 2's, and 7's all over the place.This is the true series:Zombie(fulci's classic), Zombie: Nights of Terror(a.k.a Zombie 3, but I say it's 2 because it was made before the official 3),Zombie 3,and Zombie 4: After Death.Anyway, Zombie 4: After Death is one of the best zombie films I've ever seen.It's got a cool plot, great effects, cool characters, and loads of suspense.Exciting, good story, music score, and effects.****1/2 out of *****.Hard to find, but worth the search.

'Zombie 4' AKA 'After Death' AKA 'Zombie Flesh Eaters 3' is your typical sleazy 80's Italian zombie b-movie that features lots of gore, terrible dubbing, cheesy dialogue, and plenty of outrageous moments combined with a jumbled mess of a plot. The 3rd (or 4th) flick in the 'Zombie' series is not a good movie by any means, but it does have some atmosphere and enough disturbing and disgusting enough to satisfy gore fans, other than that there's not much else.

The plot = Jenny (Candice Daly) goes back to the island where her parents were killed many years ago where they had been working on a cure for cancer and accidently raised the dead by angering a Voodoo priest. Along with Jenny is a group of mercenaries and researchers who again raises the dead and all hell breaks loose.

Despite a promising highly stylized opening featuring some cool action and gruesome kills, it's a shame that the rest of the film doesn't maintain the same energy and flair, thankfully the movie moves at a breakneck pace that bombards you with constant action and mayhem, but its devoid of any intelligence or thrills. The zombies themselves looks very cheap and uninspired; they just look like a bunch of extras with white makeup caked onto their faces. The gore effects are pretty good for such a low budget production. The direction by Claudio Fragasso is fine and the movie is shot quite well, but the plot is just pure nonsensical, and the dialogue is stupid and horrendous. This entry is definitely lacking when compared to the other 2 movies in the 'Zombie' series.

The acting performances are really hard to judge when the movie is dubbed. Jeff Stryker gives a likeable performance as the male lead and emotes quite well. The rest of the cast range between average and over the top for this kind of film.

Overall 'Zombie 4' is a somewhat dumb yet entertaining Italian zombie flick, but there's much better out there and don't waste your time with this one.

A boatload of people run into `technical difficulties' and are forced to dock on a strange island where the dead are heard screaming. They join up with some survivors running from the zombie hordes infesting the island. It seems that some odd years ago the island was a research center where the world's top scientists gathered to defeat man's worst enemy…death. But during the experiments it seems that the scientists tried to cure a young girls' disease and end up killing her instead. Unfortunately for them her big bad voodoo daddy takes it personally and opens the third doorway to hell. One girl survived the zombie onslaught and now as a woman must unlock the secret that will close the gate to hell.

The script in the end is way too disjointed. It seems that whenever the scriptwriter came up with something he would just half hazardly throw it in and hope for the best. The action/ adventure element was a nice touch and kept the pace flowing nicely. As what seems to be a common factor in Italian zombie movies we get a soft-focus look that to me is quite annoying at times. Add to the mix a rather lush jungle, at times a choking (and blinding) fog and a synth score that owes a great deal to John Carpenter and you get a above-average but rather plain (and sometimes funny) zombie flick. The makeup effects aren't anything to write home about but the zombies are relatively intelligent (they even shoot and talk) and chew the scenery with mucho gusto.

I will admit. Although Zombi 2 was my gateway into the world of Lucio Fulci several decades ago, the zombie genre never was my cup of tea. Few movies in this genre ever impressed me, the two most important would be Return of the living dead and Zombi 2, followed by Dawn of the dead and then (sorry Umberto, I know you hate it being called a zombie movie) Nightmare City. However, among the Italian spoofs that came after these mentioned films I find some of them theoretically brilliant but horribly executed. Take the two shockingly overrated Fulci films Beyond and City of the living dead. They somewhat have story, potential, budget (from what it looks like) that could have been so promising but it's all very poorly put together with cheap zoom ins despite great cinematographer, sloppy takes with goofs, bad special fx, cheesy music repeated over and over - and in all that some terrific and brilliant atmosphere and a few brilliant scenes. This is why I have learned to appreciate the really low budget versions better, because they are more honest in what they are and what you get. Andrea Bianchi's Burial Ground was utter trash first time I saw it, but almost 30 years later I love it and keep it closer than most films of this decade. Then there are the real lows, like Bruno Mattei's "Hell of the living dead" or the Fulci/Mattei/Fragasso "Zombi 3" but it's almost even worse although Fulci directed like 65 minutes of it - but the guy was not well, we must not forget. Fragasso however still was young and capable of working in the jungles of asia to do this little action packed movie, which unlike the earlier films from the most recent years, sports a really cool soundtrack by Al Festa. I particularly like the instrumental cues. It really gives the movie a lift, similar to how Simonetti took on Cut and run. For being a low budget italian movie, I think it has quite decent acting and pace if you approach it with b-movie expectations. So far, this is by far the best Fragasso film I have seen, but with that said you should still expect something in the schlocky realm. The 2K scanned Bluray from 88 films is a very welcome release. These movies deserve this kind of love!

This movie (?) doesn't really have zombies...they are more like Talking Ninja Ghouls and doesn't really have actors...they are more like people off the street. Almost has a 'porno-like' quality and feel to it. Also, has way too much back-story and way, way too much over explanation. In a nut shell, it goes something like this...some scientists on an island are trying to create the cure for cancer but they create some kind of reanimation formula and to top it off...they let this voodoo guy's daughter die...so, the voodoo guy sends his wife to hell and she comes back as a demon-like thing and everybody tries to run away, but the Ninja Ghouls get them...oh except for this little girl who wobbles away then starts to stop wobbling...but she continues and somehow finds a travel agent and gets off the island (I'm guessing because they don't show this). Anyway, I guess, we flash forward to when this little girl is all growed up, but I don't know because nobody says so and they don't even have the little '20 Years Later' graphic appear on the screen...where was I? Oh yeah, so, this growed up little girl comes back to the island...I'm not sure why...to find her parents bodies or something? But she came prepared...she has a bunch of angry army guys with her and one guy is so tough that he actually chases a zombie down and starts to beat him up for no good reason. Also, these two tough guys and a girl stroll into town...I don't know where they came from either, nor what town they're walking through...oh and one is wearing glasses which makes him smart. I think they must have used the little girls travel agent. Then people start getting torn apart...basically introduced then torn apart, to the point where it appears quite random. After people are torn apart...they come back and taunt their old friends...these are very mean spirited zombies. Where was I? I don't know...watch it and I don't think you'll know either!