Rise of the Zombies

Rise of the Zombies (2012)

** 1/2 (out of 4)

Semi follow-up to ZOMBIE APOCALYPSE has a group of survivors living on Alcatraz island but being forced off when the zombies make it through the water. The survivors then decide to try and locate a scientist who they believe has came up with a cure for the zombie epidemic. Yes, here's another one from The Asylum but it always shocks me that so many people go into these films expecting a good movie. I mean, we know their history, we know the film is starting on SyFy yet people still expect to see a George Romero film for some reason. Personally speaking, when I watch these movies I hope to at least be entertained (by good or bad things) or that the film at least offers something you don't normally see. I'm starting to wonder if people go into Edward D. Wood, Jr. films expecting the work of John Ford. Anyways, this film here certainly doesn't offer much that you haven't already seen but for the most part I found it to be entertaining for a couple reasons. One is that the gore factor has really been turned up and it's to the point where these made-for-TV movies are getting away with more than what theatrical slashers could back in the 80s. One sequence shows a doctor ripping off and cooking his own flesh so that he can feed his starving zombie daughter. There's another scene where a woman must perform a C-section to help save a baby but the really outrageous stuff happens after this. There's also the non-stop gore of zombie bites and zombies getting their heads blown off. The story itself offers up a few interesting ideas but of course none of them are ever fully developed. Mariel Hemingway, Chad Lindberg and LeVar Burton are the latest celebs to get down with The Asylum and all three actually turn in very good and believable performances. So, is RISE OF THE ZOMBIES going to make people forget NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD? Not at all but hopefully people won't come to this thinking it's going to.

The plot isn't anything new. And the execution is pretty typical.

Mariel Hemmingway's acting was outright painful. Flat line delivery, and almost never with the proper emotion. Ethan Suplee isn't much better, but thankfully he doesn't have to say much. Lavar Burton is excellent, think the emotion of I Am Legend, without the kick-ass survivalist skills. By far the most noteworthy part of the movie. Danny Trejo is as Danny Trejo is, bad-ass. You won't be disappointed by him.

The effects are decent and the gore is quality.

If you enjoy watching formulaic zombie action movies with little cinematic value, this will deliver.

Was I surprised to see Danny Trejo on a cover of a The Asylum flick. Surely on to pick up I guessed. Wrong. Danny is in it for 30 minutes and he's gone never to see again in this zombie flick.

It starts all pretty well and rather gory for an Asylum flick so I was ready for a hell of a ride, and yes, it was a hell of a ride until the car running away from the zombies crashed on San Fransisco's Lombard Street. Pure CGI and yes, Asylum cheapie. From there on this flick falls down in a lot of blah blah and here and there some zombie attack but from here too the effects of shooting the zombies was done CGI. But it wasn't all that bad, here and there I saw some rather good effects too. But I can't say that this is a must see. It's a mediocre flick for, no pun intended, no brainers. Very simple story and nothing scary or special.

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

I rarely write reviews, but this was so bad that I had to write an angry one to warn others that may flip thru the channels and catch this, thinking what I did - "there's some awesome names in this, hopefully this gets better". I was definitely impressed with the Danny Trejo and LeVar Burton being IN the movie, even tickled to see Ethan Suplee, but that enthusiasm died early on in the movie. The acting was absolutely atrocious - these members would randomly be killed and there would be a small, ten-second emotional breakdown, then nothing happened and they just kept trucking on to an ending that made no closing sense whatsoever. Mariel Hemingway was the worst actress I had ever seen and it's unfortunate for her that I had never seen her in anything before, but now THIS is what's ingrained into my memory. I don't know if all that terrible acting was intentional or not, but it completely ruined the movie for me. Then again, as someone else said, this was produced by SyFy so there's an element of immediate shame once an 'original' movie is released by that network. There's not really anything to give away because, well, the movie ended abruptly and will leave you wanting your hour and a half back.

Shocker of shockers, this is a piece of crap. I know this news will startle many of you. How could this possibly go wrong, you say? A cheaply produced zombie flick with bad special effects and a cast of has-beens and never-weres? It has classic written all over it. Yet somehow this master formula fails. It would be easy for me to blame the movie's failure completely on the Hollywood Squares cast led by Mariel Hemingway (who, no joke, I thought was deceased) and the now-elderly and overweight Danny Trejo. But the cast is only a symptom of a much larger disease: namely The Asylum, the absolute worst production company in the industry today. Possibly worst ever. They make all that terrible SyFy channel garbage we all watch and hate. It's become popular in recent years to bestow some "so bad it's good" badge upon these movies. That's unfortunate because it just encourages more subpar waste like this is produced.

This movie sucks. Don't watch it.