Zombie

 



Director - Lucio Fulci (City of the Living Dead, House by the Cemetery)
Starring - Tisa Farrow (The Last Hunter, Antropophagus), Ian McCulloch (Contamination, Zombie Holocaust), and Richard Johnson (The Raven, The Monster Club)
Release Date - 1979
Genre - Horror
Tagline - "The dead are among us"
Format - Bluray (Personal Collection) (Screener)

Rating (out of 5):

 

     Horror is a genre that has many classics.  We can trace horror history back to Thomas Edison's production company and the first adaptation of Frankenstein before moving forward to Nosferatu and moving into the beloved Universal horror age.  From then we have several trends started by classic films such as Halloween and Black Christmas are credited for creating the slasher movement.  In 1968 George A. Romero loosely adapted Richard Matheson's I Am Legend with his masterpiece Night of the Living Dead.  This film forever changed the way we saw zombies taking them from their voodoo origins and turned them into the flesh eating undead.  a decade later he released his follow up Dawn of the Dead which was released in Italy as Zombi.  the following year Italian director Lucio Fulci released his sequel to Zombi, Zombi 2, and it became a huge hit.  Gorehounds have loved the film ever since and many profess it to be the best Italian horror film to date.  I love Fulci and Zombi 2, aka Zombie in the U.S., is a fantastic film.  When Blue Underground announced that the film was restored to 4K and released on blu I had to see it.  I reached out to them and they were kind enough to send a review copy my way.  Thanks guys!.

     The film begins when a boat is found floating in a New York harbor and onboard a member of the undead.  The boat owner is missing and her daughter partners up with a journalist and another scientist where they visit a secluded tropical island in search of her father.  However, once on the island they discover that hell is now walking the Earth with the undead now rising from their graves and eating the living. 

     Zombi 2 is one of the most beloved horror films of our time.  I honestly don't know anyone that dislikes the film.  Every horror fan that I have crossed paths with absolutely loves the film but there is some that is more passionate about it than others.  I had seen the film countless times before now but I was very excited to see how Blue Underground has restored this amazing zombie masterpiece.  It's far from my favorite Fulci movie but that doesn't make it a bad film at all.  The acting in this one is great even when the cast hams it up.  In fact, the scenes where the cast is overreacting and the dubbing is off in some of my favorite scenes.  It doesn't mean they are bad actors just went overboard with their reactions.  I also love the fact that most Italian horror films are film mostly in English with other speaking some Italian but then dubbed in Italian and then redubbed in English.  This adds some charm to the film when you see them speaking English but the audio is just a fraction of a second off.  The story for this one is so much fun.  It really doesn't feel like a sequel to Dawn of the Dead which is fine because it is an amazing standalone film.  Hell, if you didn't know it was released in Italy as Zombi 2 you wouldn't know it was a sequel.  The story is interesting and very eventful but is played out in the years to follow not only by Fulci but by several other Italian directors.  Before I reviewed this one for Blue Underground I had reviewed three other films following the same storyline just last year and two more before that.  This one did start the trend though and it offers up a very interesting story with lots of action.  Finally, there is several on screen deaths that use some amazing practical effects.  They do lose their effectiveness with the bright red 3M blood but they are still fascinating to look at.  They are kills you would associate with zombies so they fit the film very well and considering that its 1979 they are rather gruesome.  Overall, Zombie is required viewing for any horror fan regardless of what style of horror you enjoy.  The movie is almost perfect and the new release from Blue Underground is phenomenal.  Grab a copy now!