Dead Alive AKA:Braindead

This is an early movie by Oscar winner Peter Jackson, of Lord of the rings fame. People will always argue which Peter is better. The goremonger of Bad taste/ Dead Alive fame or the CGI special effects guru of Lord of the ring/ King Kong fame. I am of the camp that both are tremendous. I love his old work and really dig his new word as well. The same arguments are often made about Sam Raimi. Several internet dorks argue that Peter sold out when he began making the Lord of the rings, but this is just stupid to me. He made movies he always wanted to make and happened to make a ton of money doing it. Sure I would like to see some more films from him in this vein, but you can’t fault him for doing what he really wants to do.

Dead Alive starts with a New Zealand zoo keeper captures a ratmonkey on Skull Island and returns it to the local zoo. The monkey ends up biting Lionel’s mother. The bite turns the woman undead and Lionel tries to keep her in check with tranquilizers. Of course the woman spreads the virus and Lionel and his new girlfriend fight to stay alive. First time viewers will compare this to Shaun of the dead, and wouldn’t be far off. While Shaun of the dead is a fantastic film (thinking about it makes me want to watch it again and review it here) this movie is so much more over the top Shaun can’t even touch it.

This movie doesn’t take itself seriously and is written to be much more of a comedy than horror, despite its gore and horrifying storyline. This movie has perhaps the most gore I have ever seen in a film and it is glorious. You won’t believe some of the things that Peter Jackson puts in this movie. You will laugh at things if described to you would make you sick. I won’t go into too much detail so as not to spoil it for those that have yet to see this wonderful gorefest but I actually almost threw up from laughing so hard a one point. I can’t underline the amount of gore in this film though, if you are the least bit squeamish you may want to have a trashcan nearby.

My rating 9 out of 10

Review by Elvis Lawson

Here is the trailer.