(Doug is the guy in plaid in the middle)
LIVING DEAD WORLD (2005)

www.evilgeniusentertainment.com

Directed By Mike Zawacki

Starring

Michelle Roberts as Sarah Bowman

Eric Maurer as Marshall Ryan Thomas

Michael Reed as Dirty Sanchez

And Douglas A. Waltz as a Zombie!

Marshall Thomas (Maurer) is transporting vile criminal Dirty Sanchez (Reed, with the greatest name ever for a criminal) to an undisclosed location. Meanwhile Sarah Bowman (Roberts) is celebrating her anniversary with her husband when a small device comes down from space and lands in an alley in small town USA. It doesn’t take long before a scruffy, homeless guy decides to try and touch the damned thing and it explodes. The explosion has two effects; First, it acts like an EMP so anything electrical is wiped out. No lights, no means of transportation. Second, anyone struck by the blast in over a hundred mile radius is transformed into a hungry, violent zombie drooling a black, viscous liquid.

Luckily for Sarah her husband’s idea of a good time is hanging out in an old bomb shelter. Too bad he decides that he has to go up and investigate the noise when the initial explosion hits. Since Sarah has her shirt off it takes her longer to get topside and the blast has passed over before she can get topside. In the same stretch of luck Dirty Sanchez had managed to elude the grasp of Marshall Thomas and was hiding in a cellar. Thomas found him and they were struggling in the cellar when the blast went off.

In classic B movie fashion we now have our erstwhile cast of characters and the show can go on.

Sarah’s husband takes a while to die and they make their way to an old warehouse. Sanchez and Thomas wind up in the same place after investigating the nearby house and discover that a party was going on. Dead bodies are everywhere and it doesn’t take long before they get up and attack the pair. They hole up in the warehouse too, but it becomes apparent that no amount of barricading is going to keep these zombies out until daybreak when they feel they can make a break for it.

Salvation comes in the form of drunken redneck, Cooper. Armed with a massive shotgun and an inebriated fearlessness, Cooper is the key to their escape. An old plane in a nearby airfield is their means of escape of LIVING DEAD WORLD, but they have to battle through legions of the undead to get there. Will they make it?

LIVING DEAD WORLD holds a special place in this reviewer’s heart as you can tell by the credits. I accidentally happened upon a casting call for zombies on the internet and it coincided with my oldest son, Seann’s, birthday. It became the ultimate birthday present. To go spend the whole night in Ann Arbor at an old, dilapidated warehouse/icehouse and menace the stars of the film. It was cold and miserable and it seemed to take hours to get into makeup. The make up artist especially liked that I didn’t fit the twenty something mold of the rest of her zombie horde. Neither did my fifteen year old son. She put a couple of amazing appliances on me and did wild things to my hair, which is now completely shaved off. I looked like I belonged on the cover of a Rob Zombie album. During the filming I got hip checked and sent smashing to the concrete floor of the warehouse. This wouldn’t seem so bad except that I had just had carpal tunnel surgery a few months prior and it hurt like the dickens! Trooper that I am I just whined a little, okay a lot, and ate some pizza and carried on. The fall is still in the flick but you have to look to catch it. You don’t have to look to catch me or Seann though. We must have had something because we turn up repeatedly throughout the assault on the warehouse. We both get really good close ups and action shots.

Now, how was the movie? I must say that is exceeds what I saw on the night of filming. The lighting is great and moody. The whole film has a pervasive sense of dread and why shouldn’t it? Director Zawacki has placed his heroes in the worst possible scenario. Nothing electrical works, they have no information as to why this is happening, they don’t know the extent of the infestation and these zombies don’t go down easy. Shoot ‘em in the head? If it doesn’t destroy the head completely, like a shotgun blast, forget it. They keep coming back for more. They don’t run as much as move with purpose, but that’s still a damned sight faster than a Romero zombie ever was. Add to that they seem to be able to communicate with each other through a high pitched screeching noise and… well, this ain’t your father’s zombie I’ll say that.

At a running time of 87 minutes the film blazes by. There is no lag time. Even the scenes of trying to fortify their defenses moves at an insane clip. The characters are all well rounded and believable. My favorite would have to be Cooper who steals every scene that he’s in. There are numerous nods to other zombie flicks which I found enjoyable and not in the nudge nudge wink wink kind of way. It was more of a heartfelt, honest homage kind of way.

Zawacki and crew at Evil Genius Entertainment (www.evilgeniusentertainment.com) have done the impossible. Using a micro budget and a cast of unknowns they have created a worthy addition to the zombie mythos.

Now, let’s talk about my part in the sequel. After all, I didn’t get killed in the first one and I still have my shirt from the flick. Of course I’ll need a wig since I shaved my head, but that shouldn’t be a problem…