Detention of the Dead

An eclectic group of high-school teens in detention—cheerleader Janet (Christa B. Allen) and her boyfriend Brad (Jayson Blair), geek Eddie (Jacob Zachar), pretty goth Willow (Alexa Nikolas), jock Jimmy (Max Adler), and stoner Ash (Justin Chon)—find themselves trapped in the school library after a zombie outbreak turns all of their classmates into ravenous gutmunchers.

Detention of the Dead is harmless enough fun, but in a world where a new zombie film seems to claw its way to the surface on a daily basis, it simply doesn't do enough to distinguish itself from the competition. The characters are all stereotypes—although that's forgivable given that the film is clearly inspired in part by The Breakfast Club—but for Detention of the Dead to have been really successful, it would have needed far better gags, a few genuine scares, and much more creative zombie mayhem. I'd liked to have seen director Alex Craig Mann really go to town with the splatter, but then again, maybe the budget for such carnage just wasn't available.

I rate Detention of the Dead a passable 5 out of 10, although I was tempted to deduct a point for the obvious in-jokes, most notably the characters named after classics of the genre, something that has been done to death in comedy horror films over the years (the library is named after make-up legend Tom Savini; Brad, Janet and Eddie are all characters from The Rocky Horror Picture Show; Willow is from Buffy the Vampire Slayer; Ash is, of course, from The Evil Dead; admittedly, I haven't the foggiest who Jimmy is named after).

This movie mixed of Detention meet Dance of the Dead ,

The movie dose not take to long to get going and there are some very funny moment that made me laugh out loud.

we got normal detention group, Jock guys, hot cheerleader, goth girl, Drug guy and Nerd guy all in Detention.

Also guys come to seem to feel unwell and then hell break lose of cause

There were some silly over the tops here and there and some of the jokes can go on bit long, but it got laughing.

Some part of the movie are little boring for zombie there, Didn't really do much and sit and talk few room, which I could not case less about.

It did start bit gory but as the movie went the zombie deaths seem to less bloody not really really that gory.

I give 4.8 out of 10, It made laugh,, I just round it's off to 4 out of 10

A perfect example of how you could ruin a gory start of a zombie flick into a love story. I have no problem to bring in love into horror but here it overruns the death. And that's the major problem with Detention Of The Dead.

It has been compared with Shaun Of The Dead (2004) but on that part I don't agree. I never laughed with the jokes because they were again for an American release very childish. The farts, that has to be in every US comedy, how stupid is that. On the other hand when they start talking like in The Breakfast Club (1985) then again I prefer The Breakfast Club because it do has funny situations but here they are trying to make it funny with the sexy cheerleader known for sucking off every guy on school, the nerd falling in love with her and finally does, that's one you see coming from the first minute but hey, there's the weirdo, the goth chick who falls for the nerd and of course the muscled guy who dates the cheerleader. But all situations are so predictable that it even becomes a bit boring.

The final is a bit better because the zombies are coming in again. Still, the zombies looked rather good and some attacks were really messy and even sometimes gory. An ideal flick to start the evening while necking some brewies with your pals.

Gore 1,5/5 Nudity 0/5 Effects 3/5 Story 2,5/5 Comedy 0,5/5

Jacob Zachar is geeky Eddie. Alexa Nikolas is goth chick Willow. Christa B. Allen is cheerleader Janet. Jayson Blair is jerky Brad. Justin Chon is stoner Ash. Max Adler is meathead football player Jimmy.

They are all stock characters being completely stereotypical. The big problem being that they are all too old to be in high school. This is especially true for Jacob Zachar. He's suppose to be a geeky weakling, and he looks more like a haggard teacher. In fact, the only one that could pass for a high schooler is Alexa Nikolas, and just barely.

This is a weak effort from first time writer/director Alex Craig Mann. It's a derivative story of every other high school zombie movie. There is nothing new in the script or in the directing. Maybe he's trying to parody the whole genre by mocking it with a stupid weak Zombie Breakfast Club. But even a parody would add something new rather than just copying everything.

A group of oddball high school students find themselves trapped in detention with their classmates having turned into a horde of Zombies.

This is not necessarily a good film, and it is not a surprise to me that the movie has generally low reviews on IMDb. A bit lower than I expected, but maybe it just has not hit the target audience yet. Although, there is a bit too much down time between the jokes to really keep the momentum going, and some of the events go past parody or homage to downright theft (the "Breakfast Club" ripoff where they each explain why they have detention in particular).

This might fall under the category of guilty pleasures, though, for zombie and horror fans. There are countless references, and I am sure I did not catch them all: Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Night of the Living Dead, Evil Dead, Twilight and Rocky Horror Picture Show come to mind. There is an homage to Sam Raimi's directing style, the library is named after effects guru Tom Savini... and in one piece of dialogue, two characters mention all the ways that a zombie outbreak has begun in other films.

This may not be a keeper, but it is definitely worth renting for those who like clever references to other horror flicks. (Or sometimes not so clever -- the Savini reference got a bit too much screen time to be subtle.)