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John Allman

If you’ve ever wandered the aisles at the video store or surfed the DVR pay-per-view options and seen a bunch of movies that you’ve never heard of, chances are John has watched them. Why? He loves movies. All kinds of movies. Good, bad, so-bad-they’re good, even the truly unwatchable ones. He mostly loves horror and science-fiction and drive-in exploitation movies that most upstanding model citizens wouldn’t dare watch. Then he writes up his thoughts so you can decide - watch, don’t watch or avoid at all costs. Sometimes he even gets to talk to the cool folks who make some of your favorite films.

Blood, Violence and Babes
John Allman

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Deadgirl

Posted Oct 10, 2009 by John Allman

Updated Oct 10, 2009 at 10:28 AM

Deadgirl
Genre: Horror/Zombie
Directed by: Marcel Sarmiento and Gadi Harel
Run time: 101 minutes
Rating: Unrated
Format: DVD

The Lowdown: As low-budget, independent horror goes, so goes the pulse of the collective Fangoria-loving fan base.

We’re tired of the same run-of-the-mill, rip-off stories that get dusted off and regurgitated every year, either straight-to-DVD or in limited theatrical release.

It’s always the smaller, quietly-buzzed about films that should make the most significant impact. Sometimes they do, like “The Evil Dead,” arguably one of the greatest no-budget creative success stories of all time. Sometimes they should connect, but fail to find the right audience, despite being brilliant, like 2007’s amazing, coming-of-age gorefest “Teeth.”

“Deadgirl” is very much like those movies.

Shot on a minimal budget with a relatively unknown cast, directors Marcel Sarmiento and Gadi Harel create an unbelievably taunt, surprisingly poignant and harrowingly bleak picture of innocence lost – not in the high school halls, but a dank basement of a shuttered psychiatric hospital where an unwitting sex slave is discovered, unwilling and undead.

Yep, that’s right: What we have here is a shining example of the not-so-good necrophilia.

Best friends, and fringe dwellers, Ricky and JT stumble upon the title character, a very naked, very strapped-down female zombie in her late teens, early 20s. JT (the creepily effective Noah Segan) wants to use the dead girl to fulfill his horndog fantasies. Ricky (Shiloh Fernandez), the more sensitive, brooding one, thinks they should just leave her alone. He already loves another, living girl, whom he can barely speak to out of awkward frustration.

They make one of those movie pacts – no one else but us, and I mean NO ONE, can know about this – that you know is going to end poorly.

And sure enough, by the next day, JT is building a swank bachelor love pad in the hospital’s basement and having his way in all manner of freaky zombie sex with a girl who can’t speak, much less say no.

It’s provocative but not tawdry, and if you think it’s controversial, it achieves that without being in your face.

This is not unlike any other late high school, girl comes between best friends, problems ensue, movie that you’ve seen. It just so happens to push buttons that you don’t expect: Is it rape if the girl is dead? Do the dead have feelings? Why are guys so quick to turn on one another? How far would you really go for love?

In answering most of those burning queries, “Deadgirl” gets under your skin. It bothers you. It challenges you. It does things that more experienced filmmakers with more experienced actors aren’t always able to do in much-bigger-budget movies.

Oh, and the ending. Yeah, it’s good. Real good. Worth the ride and more, in fact.

What’s the latest Hollywood blockbuster that you saw that you could say that about?

Check it out.

The Stuff You Care About:
Hot chicks – Hot, and dead.
Nudity – Yes.
Gore – Considerable.
Drug use – No.
Bad Guys/Killers – Puberty.
Buy/Rent – Buy it.
On the Web – http://www.deadgirlmovie.com/
Release Date – Sept. 15, 2009