Review of Nightmare City (1980) by Patrick M — 09 Nov 2007

Robert Rodriguez certainly took more than a little inspiration for his Planet Terror segment of Grindhouse from this film. Nightmare City is an absurd, funny, poorly written, poorly acted (and overdubbed) zombie exploitation film. These are not ordinary zombies, though. They seem to have a fetish for breasts, as they regularly impale them and suck blood out through the gashes they have made. Furthermore, they are also smarter than your average zombie in that they work in groups, and genuinely seem to be more intelligent then those running away from them. Most of the "humans" in this film never decide to arm themselves, even considering the fact that they know something is horribly wrong.

The social message is pretty funny. We get the little matter-of-fact speech from the nurse, who suddenly seems to have understood it all, telling us that the cycle of life is simply continuing and our destruction is inevitable. It was more than a little entertaining to later see her fall off the helicopter and hitting every metal post on her way down.

The double-cross (in regards to the audience) cop out at the end of the film initially seems a little annoying, but when the film ends simply with the words "And so the nightmare becomes reality!", one can't help but laugh. Every minute of this is enjoyable in all its campy goodness.