Curse of the Blind Dead

Curse of the Blind Dead is about what you would expect from a Blind Dead movie, not much on plot but with a decent amount of atmosphere and gore. The plot begins like some of the previous entries with the Knights Templar getting ready to perform a satanic ritual only to be stopped, blinded, and executed. The movie then transitions to the main story, which in this case is a post apocalyptic tale of a father trying to protect his pregnant daughter from scavengers and a cult that wants to sacrafice her child to the undead knights.

What I liked about this movie is that it moves at a brisk pace, the effects work on the Knights, and the gore. The Knights in particular look pretty good and it's a nice update to their look. The setting is also interesting enough, though it does feel like not enough was done with it.

If there is one thing I've learned from Blind Dead movies it's that it's never been big on story or acting, and in this regards the movie fits right in. The story is predictable, and the acting is pretty campy. Where the movie faulters though is that it doesn't capture the haunting feel when the Knights are on screen. The previous films used slow motion to give the Knights a very haunting feel, it's part of what made these movies stand out. This movie only does this once, and while it was nice to see again, it didn't capture that haunting feel.

Overall Curse of the Blind Dead is a middle of the road horror film. It's not awful, but it's also not great either. Blind Dead fans may dig it, or fans of campy movies.

The movie is slow, very slow. It takes almost an hour for the "zombies" to show. Until then you are subjected to ridiculous acting and story that makes little sense. The gore is good but the Templar costumes are not. How is it the "zombies" looked better in the original Blind Dead movies?

The film has zero atmosphere, zero suspense, zero tension n it is not at all scary. It has some gore n thats it. A scene is copied from Antropophagus n Cottage, the spine removal scene. We have a snake plissken a la poor man's Kurt Russell with an eye patch. Cos of the low budget they cudnt show the roads, highways or cities in dilapidated or post apocalyptic state, so they shot the entire movie in some park or fields.

Horror of the Zombies can now hold its head up high and forever cast away the shackles of being regarded as the worse Blind Dead movie.

Heck even 2009's Graveyard of the Dead/Erotic Nights of the Blind Dead felt more in keeping with the original series than this abysmal Walking Dead wannabe. The Knights Templar take forever to show up (sidelined in favour of uninteresting characters bickering amongst themselves) then when they do almost everything about their 'look' has been altered from the De Ossorio originals ('natch not for the better). They are also largely written out of the last ten minutes of the film, taking a backseat to what is obviously an attempt at building a franchise and setting up further sequels. It seems not even the blind dead are immune from the curse of 2020.

Due out on UK DVD next month (you have been warned) as 'The Curse of the Knight Templar'. They seem to be dropping the whole 'blind dead' angle for the UK, in favour of selling it as a historic adventure to the Games of Thrones crowd ...ignoring the small matter of this being a post-Apocalyptic movie!!

A film full of nonsense screaming almost all of the runtime.