Review of Dead Snow (2009) by Spangle — 10 Oct 2016

Yeah, honestly, I have no idea what I just watched. A zombie splatter film about a group of Norwegian medical students who decide to head up to a cabin in the wilderness only to come across Nazi zombies, Dead Snow is really odd. Though a highly derivative and predictable zombie film, it most certainly makes the most of its unique premise by providing a thoroughly entertaining film, even if it is light on scares.

The film's setup is pretty typical. A bunch of college kids go away for the weekend only to have sex, think about sex, and play Twister. Oh and a pair of them have sex on the toilet after the guy just took a dump. That part may be pretty unique. Of all the sex scenes I have seen in a film, two people having sex over fresh poop is most certainly a cinematic first. That is a quick way to getting a yeast infection too, fyi. Fortunately for Chris (Jenny Skavlan), she likely does not need to worry about yeast infections given the Nazi zombie infestation that soon takes hold. Fortunately, the film's build-up does not take too long, but in this opening stretch, the film reveals its major problem: its characters. Though the film did have occasionally effective scares, they were too far and in between. Thus, it could have bolstered itself with non-cookie cutter characters. Instead, these young adults are ones you have seen before and Dead Snow does nothing to add onto its wholly vanilla characters.

Next up, the film's scary factor. As a splatter film, there will most certainly be gore. Dead Snow provides a ton of the gooey stuff and seems to have particular fun pulling intestines out of its characters bodies. After watching this, my intestines are actually in pain. Never have I seen so much intestinal carnage. Most of the kills are pretty gruesome. As such, Dead Snow is not for the weak stomached population. Ironically, one of the characters, Martin (Vegar Hoel) practically faints at the sight of blood at the beginning of the film. I can only imagine he became desensitized by the very end. Unfortunately, it gets so caught up showing so much gore, there is barely any time left to scare the audience. Instead, the film relies on dumb characters who walk straight into the face of danger to try and provide scares. This move proves ineffectual as the film eventually just devolves into an action flick with a full-on battle sequence. It is almost as if it realized it was not scary enough, so it changed genres halfway through.

Maybe unintentionally, Dead Snow is quite hilarious at times. Admittedly tongue-in-cheek, Dead Snow goes purposely over-the-top at times with the killing of the zombies to great comedic effect. Given that the sequel is called a comedy by Wikipedia, I have to assume the same applies to the original given the quantity of comedic moments here. Though you have to be a little sick to find this one funny, I most certainly did find much of the final third of the film incredibly hilarious with its tongue placed firmly against its cheek.

Additionally, the film does a great job building its world. The most tension in the film is felt as you wait for the zombies to appear. You know they are coming, but the lore and the anticipation are really well executed by director Tommy Wirkola. Though I did not love how not scary the film turned out to be, the build-up is incredibly effective here. Plus, though it does go comedic at times, the film plays its absurd premise quite straight for much of the film. The end result is a film that may have fun with its original idea, but still tries to provide a straight horror film. In this way, the film does blend its horror and comedy quite well, even if it was not scary enough for my tastes.

Overall, Dead Snow makes me want to curl up in a ball and clutch my intestines tightly. Though incredibly fun, Dead Snow does little to scare or to spruce up its genre besides introducing Nazis to the equation.