Review of Dead Meat (2004) by Al M — 03 Sep 2008

Not the worst zombie movie I've ever seen, but definitely not even close to the best either. The acting was emotionless, and had that "phoning it in" quality that I'm sure you've seen elsewhere before, and there's no sense of tension because you're never given a reason to care about any of the characters. People react to the deaths of their loved ones--sometimes by their own hands--until about the end of the scene, and then promptly seem to forget about them.

But apart from the poor acting, the death scenes were so ridiculous as to be simply stupid. Examples: A zombie the blade of a shovel rammed through its midsection, but the hole was clearly only the size and shape of the handle. Not to mention the other zombie that was killed, javelin-style WITH the blunt end of the same shovel. And death by baseball? Seriously?

Also, the director apparently has no concept of distance. "Never leave the gate open!" says one character. But I can't see why it matters, when the gate appears to be a good 2 miles away from your cottage. Also, towns in Ireland appear to be a good 300 miles apart on average, because the characters started heading to "the next town over" in daylight, and still hadn't gotten there by the time it got dark. When they were already out from the last town, mind you.

Now, all of this may sound like it's shaping up for a movie that's so bad, it's good. Sadly, that isn't the case. There are a handful of scenes that are unintentionally hilarious, but they're so few and far between that they aren't worth it. And the pacing of the rest of the film renders it tremendously boring more often than not.

There are much better zombie films out there. So unless you've already seen everything else, and you're something of a completest, I'd recommend not wasting your time on "Dead Meat.".