| Spierig brothers' UNDEAD [5/10] |
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| Wednesday, 16 February 2005 | |
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Long before his Oscar-laden triumphs with the Lord of the Rings trilogy, Peter Jackson made his name with two wildly inventive, stomach-churning spoof horror/sci-fi no-budget mini-epics: Bad Taste (1987) and Braindead (1992). Undead, the debut film by Aussie twins the Spierig brothers - who direct, write, edit, produce and provide the special effects, no less - is an uneven attempt to bring this particular antipodean sub-genre back from the grave where it's festered since Jackson moved on to bigger and (admittedly) better things. The result is a ramshackle 50s-flavoured comedy-shocker which makes the most of its (visibly) restricted budget - some very impressive visual effects go a fair way towards making up for the clunky dialogue, non-existent characterisation and alarmingly variable acting. The plot is your usual alien takeover / zombies nonsense: a shower of meteors in a remote Queensland fishing village turns the locals into grunting, shambling cannibal nosferatu. A handful of hardy survivors club together, find refuge in an isolated farmhouse, and steel themselves for the looming confrontation with the flesh-eating undead massing outside. Said farmhouse is home to monosyllabic survivalist Marion (Mungo McKay), who looks like a hairy man-mountain cross between Angel star David Boreanaz and Serb director Emir Kusturica - but unfortunately lacks the thespian skills of either. While McKay hulkingly underplays, almost everyone else goes frantically OTT - worst offender is Dirk Hunter as hysterical, inept cop Harrison, who yelps his lines beyond the point of decipherability. The Spierigs clearly aren't especially bothered with their cast's shortcomings, however, concentrating instead on stoking up an atmosphere of midnight-movie anything-goes larkishness - which includes having the characters strip naked on numerous occasions for various contrived "reasons." The picture is way too long, and the baffling finale seems to have crept in from another film altogether - but in retrospect this is all entirely in keeping with the overriding "ah-f*ck-it-mate-that'll-do" ambience. Neil Young 19th December, 2004 [seen 12th October 2003 : Hyde Park Cinema, Leeds : public show - Leeds Film Festival] UNDEAD : 5/10 : Australia 2003 : "Spierig Brothers" (Michael and Peter SPIERIG) : 104 mins expansion (for Tribune magazine) of original review written October 2003 |
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