Review: Night of the Dead (Leben Tod)
Night of the Dead is an incredibly low-budget knockoff of the much superior Re-Animator series. A general rule of thumb I have when selecting a horror flick to watch is that if more than two cast and/or crew members have the same last name, I lower my expectations. In Night of the Dead, we have a writer/director, two actors and a producer all named Forsberg. Another indicator: a line on the DVD cover stating that this movie is "More shocking than Re-Animator!" My expectations were very low, but I love cheesy B (and lower!) grade horror flicks, so I gave it a chance.
For the most part, Night of the Dead is another low-budget, straight to video, forgetable zombie splatter flick. A mad scientist with an unconvincing German accent and even less convincing lab techniques has whipped up a serum that re-animates the dead, but the dead kill the living and won't die again themselves. Somehow, the re-animated dead are contagious. If you get bitten, or if their blood gets into your bloodstream, you turn into a crazy zombie, too. This movie's greatest shortcoming is that there's absolutely nothing innovative or imaginative about it. Ever single scene is interchangeable with the scenes from scores of other low-budget zombie horror movies.
Most of the acting ranges from mediocre to downright awful (particularly noteworthy in this regard is David Reynolds as Gunther, the Igor to the film's equivalent of Dr. Frankenstein). There is one actor who I found very watchable, though; Diedre Lyons, the main female zombie, does as good a job with the material she's given as I can imagine anyone doing. Clearly, she can act, and I wouldn't mind seeing more of her in future films, horror or otherwise.
Another high point in this otherwise undistinguished flick is the special effects makeup. For such a low-budget effort, some of that work is actually very good, easily on par with noteworthy films by Romero and his ilk.
There's not much more to say about Night of the Dead, though. Horror fans have seen all this before and it seems that we'll see it all again. For most viewers, the identity of this film will merge over time with those of any number of others in the genre, forming a shapeless mess quite like the buckets of gore splashed liberally about the set of the film itself.
