Black Sheep (2006)

A young man from New Zealand has an irrational fear of sheep because of a prank played on him when he worked on a sheep farm as a child. As he returns some meat is murder type activists uncover a genetic lab that is altering sheep and accidentally let one of their failures loose. Turns out that the mutation is meat hungry and his bite infects and spreads the cannibalistic urges.

This may have been my best surprise of the entire year’s worth of movies. I watch a lot of movies and often just watch one without knowing much about it. In this case I was given the movie with no case and no knowledge other than it was about killer sheep. I expected a B-movie cheese fest and was blown away at the special effects (by WETA) of a movie with a plot line like this one. The acting was also pretty good and the scenery was beautiful. The story was very comedic and pretty well put together. I honestly had no real criticism on this movie and have actually recommended it to anyone that would listen, although I usually lose most people when mention it is about killer sheep.

My rating 8.5 out of 10

Review by Elvis Lawson

Here is the trailer.

28 Days Later

An activist group raids a Chimpanzee testing facility to rescue them. A doctor there tells them to be careful since they are infected with RAGE. The rage is a virus that makes the infected crazy and bloodthirsty. 28 days later Jim wakes up in an empty hospital and walks out to an evacuated London. After finding out that his family is dead and the Rage virus has infected most of the population,he meets up with a few other people and set out to see if they can find out anything about the virus. They end up at a mansion that is now a barricaded haven for survivors that are trying to rebuild. The safe haven isn’t exactly what they had in mind though. They must fight to escape with their lives.

There was a lot I loved about this movie. For starters, I loved the look of it. Some of the shots were stunning and the look of desolation when Jim was walking around deserted London was brilliant. It is rare that a post apocalyptic movie really conveys the sense of loneliness in my eyes but this film did it in spades. I really liked the way the infected move. It is very much like the Dawn of the Dead remake in that they run and it really gives a sense of fright and the need to run. The fact that these are not zombies spares the film from slow zombie purists. The film really had great suspense and it held that suspense extremely well throughout, especially in the action scenes. This movie was not exactly true horror in that it delved a lot into Sci-Fi range but the character development and drama was leaps and bounds beyond most horror movies. The soundtrack is fantastic and really makes the end of the movie outstanding.

My rating 9 out of 10

Review by Elvis Lawson

Here is the trailer.

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.

Dawn of the Dead (2004)

Just about every single horror buff that has lived through the past century has seen Dawn of the Dead, but for those that haven’t,I will describe it for you. Dawn of the Dead is a survive-the-mass-zombie-outbreak-in-which-you-happen-to-be-one-of-the-1%-of-the-known-world-left-alive genre movie. The original took place almost exclusively in a mall while zombies swarm around and inside the said mall. The survivors are forced to avoid or outwit the zombies to retrieve items they require for sustenance while devising a plan to escape the mall and flee to safety. Overall in my opinion, this is one of the best zombie flicks created to date.

The 2004 remake of DOTD follows relatively closely with the storyline of the original with some satisfying revisions. First of all, the beginning of the film goes into much greater detail as to how the outbreak started and progressed. It then follows to how the individuals find themselves into the mall. Within the mall, differences are added with the interaction between the characters and the number of characters as well. More characters are added with a group of people who flee to the mall in a big rig. More depth is added as with family relations and having to deal with the birth of a “child”. Near the end it changes with the group of survivors flee the mall to escape to an island where they should be safe. Secondly, the zombies can HAUL ASS! Unlike the original version or basically every other zombie movie in existence, the zombies in this movie can run. In my opinion, this adds to the scary and freaky values of this movie and makes the zombies ever more human.To me it also added the question of what is next? Zombies that can operate tools and machines? Perhaps firearm wielding zombies?! Only time will answer, but for now, this is a very solid and fun-to-watch film.

Review by Tyler Zimmer

I really don’t have much to add that my son did not cover above. I will say that I know there has been a controversy since this film came out about the running zombies. Some hate that they have changed the classic zombie while others love that it adds a new dimension to the fright. I am firmly on the love them side of the line. As hard as it is to say, this film offered me more fright (well as much as someone who has seen as many horror movies as i have can feel) than any Romero film ever has. This is one of the best zombie movies i have seen in a long while.

My rating 8.5 out of 10

Review by Elvis Lawson

Here is the trailer.