Orphan (2009) That Is One Creepy Chick

Patty McCormack in The Bad Seed. Macaulay Caulkin in The Good Son. Felissa Rose in Sleepaway Camp.

Probably a good idea to add Isabelle Fuhrman of Orphan to that list of utterly creepy kids in film.

While I was mostly give or take with the film itself, Fuhrman's performance as the titular character, named Esther, was a definite standout. It's a lot to put on the shoulders of a child, but if the theme of the movie is "crazy batshit evil kid," it's expected that the best performance should come from said youngster. Those other actors I mentioned, think about it: you remember them. They carried those movies, and made it look easy. Same with little Miss Fuhrman.

As the story goes, John and Kate Coleman (Peter Sarsgaard and Vera Farmiga) are ready to adopt a child after the horrible loss of their youngest child during labor. They already have two children, grumpy pre-teen Danny (Jimmy Bennett) and cute Max (Aryana Engineer), who is also deaf. Through the magic of exposition, we discover that the Coleman family is a flawed family. John apparently cheated on Kate, and Kate herself is a recovering alcoholic. The nightmare Kate has at the beginning tells us about the pain the death of their unborn child caused.

So once John and Kate...wait...John...Kate...plus...naaaah. I'm not going there. Anyway, once John and Kate are approved to adopt, they hit up the local orphanage to scout out the rugrat talent. Who will step up and be perfect kid number three? It isn't long before they're charmed by 9-year-old Esther, a precocious (and I do loathe that word, mind you) little girl hailing from Russia. She says all the right things, paints really well, and seems like the perfect child for sure.

Yeah, right.

It doesn't take long for Esther to start her mind games. She's got some pretty glaring quirks to work through as well, including but not limited to the following:

• Fierce protectiveness of an odd Bible-like book.
• NO ONE allowed to touch ribbons on wrists and neck.
• Absolute, adult-like privacy, especially in bathroom.
• Obsessive drawing and painting.
• Well-articulated threats.
• Bad things seem to just "happen" around her.
  
• Staring. A lot of staring.

She's also a hell of a manipulator, zeroing in on the family's weaknesses with little - almost practiced - effort. Most of her evil seems to be focused on Kate with an unusual case of "adopted Electra complex." The "unusual" comes with the twist later in the movie. Esther takes steps to alienate Kate and intimidate the other kids.

She's forward-thinking enough that she knows cutting Kate's orchids - which were dedicated to her stillborn daughter - will send Kate into a frenzy. To add to the effect of her arm being grabbed, Esther puts her own arm in a vice and breaks it. That's dedication to one's craft.

Kate feels insane. She's the only one who seems to notice that something is off about Esther. "Off" is putting it nicely. Esther has the kids so frightened of her, they won't tell. Max witnesses her murdering Sister Abigail (the great CCH Pounder). Esther puts a knife to Danny's twig and berries, threatening to do some pruning if he ever crosses her. No, Kate's not the one who's insane.

In the midst of uncovering Esther's past, Esther nearly kills Danny twice for organizing a mini-uprising with Max: once by setting the treehouse on fire and causing Danny to fall, and once by smothering him with a pillow. Kate lashes out, but is subdued. This leaves Max with her grandmother, Danny barely hanging on to life in the hospital, and Esther...gulp...with John at home.

Now, here's where it gets creepy and somewhat divisive among horror fans. There's no denying that Esther is one creepy chick. What kind of creepy chick is part of the twist that has some fans cheering and others booing.

The twist? Scroll over this to see the spoiler-y words: Esther is actually a 33-year-old woman with hypopituitarism which stunts her growth - in addition, she is also batshit INSANE.

The final showdown between Esther and the Coleman family isn't without some tragedy and some laying down of the smack, and I don't think there'll be a sequel. At least, and this is spoiler material, not with Esther anyway.

I asked quite a few people what they thought of it, and I read some opinions here and there. While not as polarizing as Rob Zombie's Halloween 2, I saw and heard a lot of "oh, I loved it" and "oh, I hated it." Very few stood in the middle. The twist was admittedly a strange kind of deus ex machina, but I didn't have as much trouble with it as I imagined I would. The film looks good, has decent pacing, and is carried by very strong performances from Vera Farmiga and Isabelle Fuhrman. One of the basics of writing a story where it's one entity versus another is that those two parts should be the strongest foundation of building said story. The antagonist and the protagonist should at least appear strong, and in this case, that held up.

So, yeah, Orphan...not great, but definitely not bad. Check it out and form your own opinion.

Until next time, remember, we all have to get along in these shelters, so keep those insane urges to draw inappropriate scenes on your wall that can only be viewed with a black light in check.

Chiller Theater Expo 2010: A Few Hours Of Horror Heaven

Hey, there, survivors. The WGON Helicopter landed for the first time in Parsippany, New Jersey, to attend the Chiller Theater Expo, and oh, what a beautiful experience it was, and not just because of Twin Peaks' Sherilyn Fenn:


It was a gathering of pop culture goodness, with the strongest concentrations in horror. The Hilton was packed to the brim with fans that were not only happy to be there, but happy to be amongst others of their kind: horror aficionados that wanted a personal experience with the stars and items of their favorite genre.

Overwhelming? You bet. Mostly in a good way, but "convention regret" did set in. So many things to buy, so many people to meet. Next time, I may have to bring enough money to feed a small country to do everything I wanted to do. In reality, I don't regret a single thing about my first experience there. I just wanted to be there. Any loot I scored was going to be a bonus.

Now, without further ado, some sights from this year's Chiller Theater Expo, starting with cult film legend Jeffrey Combs (The Frighteners, Re-Animator):


One of the most charismatic actors, and one who seemed to be entirely charming, William Forsythe (Devil's Rejects, Out For Justice):


Over on b-sol's report on the show, he focused on these dolls as well, but I had to show the awesome Nurse Zombie and Shaun of the Dead dolls on display:


As a young kid, I once had a terrifying night terror about these Zuni dolls from Trilogy of Terror, an incident that steered me towards the excitement and allure of the horror genre:



One of the main reasons I wanted to go was to meet people from the original Dawn of the Dead. There were several to choose from, and I really wanted to interact with them all, but I chose one to get the autograph and picture with using my limited funds. David Crawford, who plays Dr. Foster in the film, has a short part, but delivers some of the most memorable lines in any horror film:



Yeah, that's pretty damn awesome. Well, I have to say David Crawford was equally awesome in person. A friendly, funny guy who offered to "reenact" the scene with me:



Plus, he signed a picture with the exact quote I'd hoped he would include, without me asking:

To me, that was amazing. Thank you, sir!

I also was able to score this sweet print of the British poster of Dawn of the Dead, which features prominently in the British TV series of which I seem to have an obsession, Spaced:



Worth every meager penny spent, Chiller Theater was worth it. You can rest assured that the helicopter will be fired up and flown to it next year, without hesitation.

Until next time, fellow survivors, remember to always hose off the front of your vehicle after plowing through the undead. Trust me on this.

Plague Town (2008) Sometimes "Rustic" Means "Creepy"

In the world of horror, if someone has some real estate they call "rustic," you might want to reconsider what that word means. For this reality, it might mean a beautiful, ancient home or a quaint village, but open the doors and you'll find deformed mutants whose nighttime games include torture and sadism. Oh, and the villagers aren't much help either. So go ahead and try to sell me "rustic" in a horror world. I'll stay in my zombie- and evil mutant child-proof shelter, thank you very much.

Plague Town is a neat little creeper penned by John Cregan and David Gregory, and directed by Gregory, about an unhappy family (plus one cheeky British hanger-on) getting caught in the backwoods of Ireland and stumbling upon the residents of the title town. Sounds pretty straightforward and The Hills Have Eyes-ish, doesn't it? Yeah, it's pretty similar in tone to that early Wes Craven offering, but Plague Town stands well on its own.

In a prologue, we see that this unnamed town has had some kind of curse on it that causes its newborns to be deformed, ugly little mutants. A priest declares that the children must die as they're born, but one father stands up and murders the priest, declaring the children will live.

Jumping into the story proper, in a largely unsuccessful family bonding outing to Ireland, father Jerry (David Lombard), fiancee Annette (Lindsay Goranson - who looks like a younger Sigourney Weaver to me), mouthy oldest daughter Jessica (Erica Rhodes), brooding younger sister Molly (Josslyn DeCrosta), and aforementioned cheeky British hanger-on Robin (James Warke) leave a tour bus to explore the countryside, but not without having sniping family battles. Jess and Robin wander off to make out somewhere and cause the family to miss the bus. Solution? You guessed it. Find the nearest sign of civilization and call for help. Yeah, that always works.



Wandering down an old road, the group stumbles onto an abandoned French car, but not after Molly sees a grinning face leering out of the woods like the Joker saying a quick hello. The family takes shelter in the car. Robin decides to swagger off to look for help, and Jess runs off to catch up with him. They hear laughing and discover a quaint little home, empty when they enter. After almost engaging in a game of Slap and Tickle, they hear sounds and investigate, finding a strange farmer who makes odd advances at Jess. When Robin tries to defend her, the farmer shoots Robin in the face. Jess runs and hides in the woods.

Hearing the gunshot, dad Jerry storms off into the foggy night to look for his daughter. Instead, he finds the same quaint little home, now occupied by two giggling, freakish little girls who like to play games. Creepy games with sharp objects. Oh, and piano wire, which leads to a pretty impressive little death scene when they wrap the wire around Jerry's head and...well, Jerry flips his lid. Heh. Yeah, just kick me now.

Back at the car, Molly and Annette hear strange noises, but refuse to go off into the woods. Pretty good idea for the time being, but short-lived. Several mutant children viciously attack them. In one of the more disturbing scenes, one of the children bludgeons Annette into oblivion (read: in the face) with a hubcap. Molly escapes and tears off into the woods.

In the meantime, Robin is somehow still alive with a massive wound to the face. A woman finds him and takes him back to her home so he can meet "Rosemary," her grandmother. The old lady makes strange allusions that Robin can't leave and that he's meant to meet Rosemary. Oh, and he does. She's a sprightly young thing and as evil mutant girls with the intent to mate and kill go, she's fairly hot. She also has no eyes, save for the fake ones attached to the lace mask on her face. When Robin rejects her, wanting to go get help, they decide he's not the one for her anymore. Robin barely gets away, but by then, grandma's calling in the mutant troops.




Jess, in the meantime, has been strapped to a tree and whipped with branches by the kids until they hear the old lady's alarm to flush Robin out of the woods. Two strapping young lads stay behind to play Throw The Sickle At The Girl for a while, until Molly appears and rescues her sister. Angry and scared, the girls fight back with a vengeance, slaughtering the two boys.

Eventually, Rosemary catches up with Robin, and has one of her brethren thrust a stick into his neck, finally killing him. They weave sticks into his face and eyes, then hang up him to throw objects at him. Really, rejection is not handled well in Plague Town.



Molly and Jess work their way into town, where they find a pregnant woman who pleads with them to take her away. Jess and Molly are subdued by townsfolk, who extract blood from them, wondering if they'll be "cleansed" this time. In another daring attempt at escape, Molly, Jess, and the pregnant woman nearly make it out of town before they're overwhelmed on a bridge. When Molly awakens, she's in a room with three other young girls and a baby with no eyes. One girl is speaking French, presumably from the car found earlier. One girl explains that she's had numerous babies by the townsfolk, each a mutant. It's with this horrible realization that Molly now knows she's intended to be a brood mare, one of many in an attempt for this town to have "normal children."

Plague Town is very low-budget, but very impressive with what is done with that budget. No fancy special effects here. You get creepy lighting and reliable suspense to support the ghastly images and occasional gore. There are a few missteps with the whole thing, most notably the script. Some of the dialogue is noticeable, and not in the best way. That said, it's pretty easy to overlook the silly phrases and strange word choices - as well as some of the shaky camera work - when the creepiness and great pacing keep drawing you in, and that's fine with me. What also struck me was the wonderful score by Mark Raskin: minimal, surreal, and reminiscent of Akira Yamaoka's work on the Silent Hill games.

It's a straightforward movie, offputting and creepy at all the right moments. Give it a chance, and you may like it as well.

Hopefully, I won't land the ol' chopper in a town like this. Got enough to worry about with the undead all over the place. Take care out there, survivors, and you out there in Ireland, don't go wandering into "rustic areas" without taking an axe, or a gun, or...well, you know.

In The Helicopter Bay 4-8-10

Nice weather + non-horror films in my mail = laziness.

Yeah, I've been slacking again lately, but I'll have more reviews coming soon. In the meantime, it's another edition of The Helicopter Bay while I do some routine cleaning of the chopper. Zombie brains are pretty hard to clean off the blades, but I was showing off during that last rescue.

Onto the tasty tidbits:

* While I had no horror movies to report on, I did manage to see a few others of varying degrees of quality:

--2012 didn't fail to disappoint. I knew going in that it was going to be a simple, over-wrought disaster movie. But even the scenes of wanton destruction left me hoping for a more spectacular end to the world. The movie was about an hour too long and was full of convenient deus ex machina. "Oh, hey, he happens to be a pilot!" Yeah, lots of those.

--On the other hand, the brilliant Black Dynamite was like a hidden treasure. Slightly more subtle and closer to a real homage than the very funny I'm Gonna Git You Sucka, the movie was simply a great time with an intentionally so-bad-it's-good script and blink-and-miss sight gags. Highly recommended.



* It's looking more and more likely that a trip will be made to attend this year's Chiller Theater Expo in New Jersey. More details to come because I don't want to jinx it.

* Horror movies are on their way to me now, including Orphan - which I've heard both good an bad things about (mostly bad, to be honest) - and Plague Town, which I know nearly nothing about. I need to take more advantage of the instant watch gimmick on Netflix, too.

* With "The Walking Dead" really moving along as a TV series at AMC, I'd definitely like to write a blog about the comic, as it is quite honestly a brilliant book. Recently, another plague-centered comic, "Crossed," finished up and is about to have a spin-off called "Crossed: Family Values," written by David Lapham and drawn by Javier Barreno. I'd like to do a write-up on the original series before the spin-off is released.



Well, that's about it from here. I'd better get the hose going to spray off the chopper's windshield before it gets too gunky. Take care out there and don't hesitate to radio if you need assistance. That approaching loud recording of Motorhead's "Ace Of Spades" will be me.

Be safe, survivors!

Lake Mungo (2008) Secrets, Sadness, and Scares

When it comes to horror movies, I've been around the block a few times. Seen some wild movies in my many years on this zombie-infested Earth. As I got older, I got wiser to the ways of filmmaking so that the old trope "it's just a movie" became ingrained.

But Lake Mungo made me turn the lights on.

The last movie to do that may have been my first-ever viewing of The Exorcist back in '88, and I was a semi-mature adult then. I'm still a semi-mature adult now, and I'm telling you, Lake Mungo gave me the heebie-jeebies.

I'm going to break tradition here and change up the recap a little. You know I like to run down the movie, even throw in some spoilers just to whet your appetite, but I want to take a different approach to this one. There's something special about Lake Mungo.

This Australian offering, written and directed by Joel Anderson, is filmed documentary style and has all the trappings of a serious documentary about a young girl's death: news reports, emergency call recordings, interviews with friends and family, and barely-there ambient music. This movie not only looks like a documentary, it feels like one.

Right away, we learn that 16-year-old Alice Palmer (Talia Zucker) has gone missing and presumed dead while swimming with her family. They hold out hope that she's still alive somehow, but those hopes are dashed when her body is discovered downriver. The Palmer family - father Russell (David Pledger), mother June (Rosie Traynor), and brother Mathew (Martin Sharpe) - must now deal with the death of their sweet Alice. By all accounts, she was bright, popular, and sweet, and it's true, the poor girl did not deserve this death.



A few days after her funeral, strange things begin happening, according to Russell. Unexplained sounds, realistic dreams, and doors closing on their own are some of those strange things. The family's dealing with stress of their own, as June relates she's not sleeping and entering other people's houses to "be inside someone else's life for a while."

Mathew is an amateur photographer, and captures an image of what he is sure is Alice in the backyard. Another man surveying the river levels captures what appears to be Alice in a photograph. Later, when Mathew sets up a video camera, he captures an image of someone coming out of Alice's room. Cue those sets of chills. June becomes convinced Alice is a ghost in their home and contacts a psychic, Ray Kemeny (Steve Jodrell). She brings him to the rest of the family in order to hold a seance, which Mathew videotapes. Sure enough, another image appears and yeah, the chills come right back.

When a couple out videotaping at the same river captures an image of someone there, the film takes an interesting turn. Things turn out to be not quite as they seemed, and it goes much deeper than that. But wait, the movie's not entirely halfway over yet. Surely, there's more to come.


Oh, yes. Much more. So much more is to be revealed about Alice. When the movie takes the aforementioned turn, we know very little about the young woman, other than that she was a vibrant, sweetheart of a girl whom everyone loved. Yes, there is so much more to be learned about Alice, and it is sad and it is heartbreaking.

"Alice kept secrets. She kept the fact she kept secrets a secret."

Not only do Alice's heartbreaking secrets come to light, it turns out she'd been following a path for a period of time leading up to her death. As her family uncovers clues, they're led to Lake Mungo, a prehistoric lake turned sand dune, where Alice had recently gone with her class for an overnight outing. What is revealed on cell phone footage is not only telling, but downright chilling. And I mean right to the bone. You might find your breath hitching, as if you're trying to wake up from your own sudden nightmare. It will hit you. Trust me on this.

Lake Mungo leaves you with a sense of immense sadness after the creepiness of the climactic scene fades (or does it really fade?). It's the story of a family reeling from grief, then punched in the gut by the secrets that Alice harbored. They strengthen their own bonds over this series of devastating emotions, but Alice is still dead. By the end of the movie, you feel the sadness of her life as well as her death. You might even want very much for her to have lived somehow so she could have grown past what we discover about her.

With a faux documentary, one of the traps is the actors are just that: actors. There is a difference between those trained to be in front of a camera and those that might be hurriedly coached. Recently, I caught a bit of The Fourth Kind. The "real" footage in that movie looks pretty good. In fact, it looks too good. It's framed too well and the nuances of the performances are too obvious. You can tell it's acted. In Lake Mungo, don't be surprised if you want to check around to see if this really is a documentary about the Palmer family. The acting is so natural, and they seem like real people you may actually know.

I was warned by my fellow blogger The Jaded Viewer that I might turn the lights on during this movie. I thought, "sure, that'll happen." It did. And I'm not ashamed to admit it, either. This movie was creepy for all the right reasons. It gets under your skin and into your head. You won't forget it. For now, enjoy the trailer:



OK, dear survivors, it's time to get the chopper up in the air. Remember, get some earplugs if the moans of the undead start making you feel a little batty.

The Thaw (2009) Global Warming Might Suck

I can recall a time when global warming was the scary scenario du jour and no matter which side you stood on the debate, it was a rich topic. Of course, when the zombies rose, it kind of got shuffled to the back of our collective brains. Those brains that weren't being dined on, that is. In movies, we were treated to the grand spectacle - with a sizable grain of salt - to the effects of global warming in The Day After Tomorrow. The spectacle in The Thaw, written by Mark A. Lewis and Michael Lewis, and directed by the former Lewis, is less grandiose but still a little chilling to think about.

So after we see some video footage of a bug peeking cutely out of a wound on a woman's forehead, there's a montage of warnings about the end of the world, mostly through global warming. There's even a nice cameo by William B. Davis aka The Cigarette Smoking Man from The X-Files. Once we settle in, we meet Dr. David Kruipen (Val Kilmer) and his crew trying to tag a polar bear. They do and they get a bonus...well, sort of. Turns out the bear was gnawing on the carcass of a perfectly-preserved wooly mammoth buried in the glacial flow.

"Did you know I was in Real Genius?"

Back in the lower forty-eight, a group of students is gathered to join Dr. Kruipen. In the meantime, Kruipen calls his estranged daughter, Evelyn (my good friend Andre Dumas...no, wait, Martha MacIsaacs) to join him as well. She's still pissed at him over her mother's passing, but eventually gives in.

Things get weird when Kruiper and his colleagues have to put down their dog and talk about "being ready." One of the scientists, Jane, seems a little under the weather, too. Something ain't right.

Whoa, that's a lot of bugs.

Evelyn joins students Federico (Kyle Schmid), Ling (Steph Song), and Iceman...I mean, Atom (Aaron Ashmore) along with non-WGON helicopter pilot, Bart (Viv Leacock) to journey to Kruipen's camp. Bart indicates that Evelyn is not to come along, citing a sudden change of plans directly from Kruipen himself, but she is insistent.

The camp's deserted, except for the previously-mentioned polar bear, now dead and rotting in a lab. While posing for a picture with it, Bart is bitten by something. Finally communicating by radio, Kruipen tries to tell Evelyn she shouldn't have come. On-the-rocks but horny couple Feddy and Ling have a semi-romantic roll on the floor, interrupted only by Feddy's sissified reaction to seeing one of the bugs skitter under Ling's sleeping bag. Seems he's a little scared of bugs.

After a messy gun battle at the outer camp, Sara leaves Kruipen for dead and motors back to the camp. As morning breaks, she arrives in pretty bad shape. And things are getting worse for the makeshift Scooby gang, as Bart's arm is infected, Ling is breaking out in weird sores, and Feddy's peeing blood. Just before dying a seriously icky death, Sara warns Evelyn to not "let them leave." Turns out she has the same sores and egg growths that the polar bear had, and that Bart and Ling have.

"I'm supposed to have ice powers, but this'll do."

Turns out the bugs aren't actually insects at all. They're vertebrates, and that becomes their nickname for the rest of the movie. They're sort of the evil tag-team of the prehistoric world, as the male bites a victim's skin, creating a hole for the female to crawl into and lay eggs. Lots of eggs. More eggs than should be allowed. Ling is then quarantined and Bart decides to have his arm chopped off to stop the spread through his body. You know those "stop the infection by removing a limb" moments never turn out pretty, and this one doesn't disappoint.

Things go from bad to aw-what-the-HELL bad when the bugs multiply like little crawling reality shows. The scene of what's left of the polar bear entirely covered by a shimmering blanket of bugs is - despite the obvious computer effects - pretty unsettling. Feddy, in his confusion and phobia, shoots the extremely infected Ling, but she survives the shot. In a final act of compassion, Bart enters the bug-infested room and cradles the girl as the bugs close in on their bodies. Brrrr.

A desperate Feddy is killed by a returning Dr. Kruipen and it's a joyous reunion for about five seconds. See, Dr. Kruipen is an extreme environmentalist. Sure, he's respected, but he has some rather radical views. It's revealed that he has infected himself so that he'll be a "Patient Zero" of sorts, spreading a disease that will, in his mind, surely be contained but only after the danger of global warming is made glaringly obvious.

And most people just do a Power Point presentation.

Didn't know flatulence was a side effect of hosting prehistoric parasites.

Kruipen tries to leave on a rescue helicopter, and strand Evelyn and Atom at the Arctic station. He knows it's harsh, but he thinks she'll be safe there. Atom tries to throw off the chopper's flight by hanging on, but he's thrown off to the ground in a fatal fall. Evelyn then displays more badassery and fires a rifle at the chopper until it crashes into the station, killing all aboard and presumably the vertebrates inside. Climbing into a grounded chopper, Evelyn remains until another rescue chopper arrives and takes her to safety. According to the epilogue, she's eventually hailed as a hero for bringing to light the disaster that never happened.

I like it when my friends save the world.

Although, during said epilogue, a dog is shown chewing on a dead bird. A dead bird chock full o' prehistoric parasitic vertebrates. Yum. He then joins his master for a drive...towards a city.

The Thaw is a decent little movie, part of the Ghost House Underground movie collection. The acting is not bad at all and the gore will keep the bloodhounds fairly satisfied. I expected more creepy-crawly sensations, but it didn't skeeve me out as much as I hoped it would. You'd think it would be a more "political" movie, since the real evil of the film is man's ignorance of an increasingly ruined world that he may have created. There isn't really any preaching because the balance is struck between that ignorance and the radical methods Dr. Kruipen wants to employ and that Atom endorses until he comes to his senses. No preaching, no politics, and an easy viewing make it something okay to watch once and be done, or to catch late-night, perhaps watered-down on SyFy. It's nothing bad, but nothing memorable either.

Little did they know about the other disease that changed our world, eh, fellow survivors?

Until next time, be safe and bar the windows...

Dead Snow (2009) Chainsaws, Nazi Zombies, and Outhouse Sex

Years ago, and I mean MANY years ago, I was an exchange student to Sweden. It was easily one of the greatest years of my life, and a great memory of how things were before the undead rose. There were definitely no Nazi zombies on any of the ski trips my host family took me on and I don't remember any machine gun snowmobiles. One thing I can tell you: northern Scandinavia during winter is absolutely gorgeous.

Dead Snow (aka Død Snø) is a fun little Norwegian movie directed by Tommy Wirkola, and written by Wirkola and Stig Frode Henriksen. There was considerable hype leading up to my viewing of it, and while it didn't replace Shaun of the Dead or Zombieland as my favorite zombie comedies, it was still a joyful, bloody little romp through the snow-covered mountains of Norway.

When the film opens, a young woman run in pure panic through the dark Norwegian wilderness, pursued by something we can't quite see. She tumbles down a hill, breaking her leg and ending up trapped in a thicket. Whatever was chasing her catches up and engaging in a growling feast as the main title appears on the screen.

From there, we meet a couple groups of cheeky medical students. The men: catalog model-esque Vegard, studious Martin, dirty-minded Roy, and nerdy Erland. They're on their way to Vegard's girlfriend Sara's cabin for a little ski trip full of snow and a high potential of bumping uglies. In the other car are three of the four women: sensible Hanna, sexy-nerdy Chris, and quiet Billie Piper-lookalike Liv. The fourth is Sara, who we later learn is legging it through the wilderness to get there. Uh-oh. That means the woman in the beginning...? Yep. That was Sara.

Beer?

The vacation kicks off just fine, as they typically do in these movies. Vegard brought his prized snowmobile and after setting out ahead of the others to warm up the cabin, gives everyone inner tube rides. No, that's not a euphemism. Everyone wonders where Sara is, but the party rages on into the night. There are couples, as Martin and Hanna have paired off and Chris periodically flirts with Erland, much to his surprise. A knock on the door might mean Sara's joined the party, but alas, no. It's a strange hiker who somehow - don't ask me - found the cabin and wants nothing more than a cup of coffee and to share a terrifying story of a cruel Nazi officer named Herzog. Seems Herzog held the local town - a port for the Nazi navy - in his iron fist, robbing and slaughtering townsfolk until they rose up against him. He was forced to head into the hills, where he and his men were never found. After his rousing story, he's off to continue his hike. Not long after he sets up camp, some fast-moving shapes slit his throat and attack him in his tent.

The next day, Vegard decides to take the snowmobile to look for Sara. He instructs the others to go get help if he isn't back by the following day, then takes off into the mountains. The others, though originally spooked by the hiker's story, continue the party after Vegard leaves. While groping for more beer, Erland finds a box full of gold trinkets and German medals. The medical students are overwhelmed with joy and some proclaim to do what I'd do: pay off their student loans. Vegard, meanwhile, not only finds what's left of the old hiker, but falls into a snow-covered cave.

After night falls, things start getting darker and I'm not talking about the sky. It's all fun and games at first. Erland shuffles out to the outhouse to have a bit of a dump, and we all know outhouses in horror films are bad news. In one of the most outrageous scenes in the movie, Chris finally makes her move on Erland. In the outhouse...AFTER he "releases the hounds." And to add to the gross-out factor, she sucks on his fingers. I thought employees were supposed to wash after using the restroom.

Outhouse sex...this can't end well, zombies or no zombies.

Well, they have their fun and Erland returns to the party so Chris can use the facilities. You know someone's going into the toilet when a horror film includes an outhouse, and sure enough, in goes Chris. Sadly, she'll never get to profess her continuing feelings for Erland. Instead, she meets Herzog's men and they didn't bring flowers or even a six-pack of Carlsberg.

The zombies attack the cabin, forcing the students to barricade the place. Erland, the resident horror movie nerd, proclaims them zombies and tells everyone not to let them bite. Not long after that, Erland is ripped apart by several zombies in one of the wackiest on-screen deaths in a while. Basically, they pull his skull apart until his brain plops neatly on the floor. Insanity, I tell you. Erland's body seems to be enough for the Nazi invaders at this point, so the other four are able to last the night.

Vegard, as it turns out, isn't dead. He wakes up and explores the cave, finding Nazi flags and helmets, not to mention Sara's severed head. He fights off a couple of the zombies, even using one's intestines to keep from falling into a gorge. This doesn't, however, prevent him from being bitten badly on the neck. After stitching himself up - medical student, after all - Vegard scores a sweet machine gun from the bunker and attaches it to his snowmobile.

Hell. Yes.

Back in the cabin, the four survivors decide to split up. The men set out to distract the zombies while the girls make a break for the cars. Hanna and Liv run, then split up to escape throngs of zombies. Liv is taken down and disemboweled, and in a very cool perspective shot, we see it through her eyes. She smartly sets off a hand grenade attached to one zombie and is able to take out a couple. Hanna keeps running, doing battle with a zombie on a cliff as she intentionally cracks the ice shelf holding them up and they tumble into a valley.

What they wouldn't give for showshoes right about now.

Roy and Martin discover the shed has all sorts of handy weapons and in a scene obviously in tribute to Bruce Campbell arming up in Evil Dead II, they prepare for battle with chainsaws, hatchets, and sledgehammers. In a truly fantastic battle scene full of zombie cannon fodder and stark gore on white snow, the pair actually win the first round, but not without casualties. Vegard shows up and mows down a ton of Nazi undead before being literally ripped apart. Hanna survives the fall earlier and makes it back, only to be accidentally killed by Martin while in a battle rage. Never, ever try to grab a guy covered in zombie blood and swinging a hatchet. Still, a victory is a victory...

That is, until Herzog bellows for reinforcements.



Oh, shit.

Another battle ensues, but Martin is bitten. Remembering what Erland had said about zombie bites, Martin takes his own arm off with the chainsaw. Hardcore.

Herzog calls for even more zombies, so Plan B. Plan B involves running really fast. It works for a while, but Roy is cut down by Herzog. Before devouring Roy, Herzog loots him. This gives Martin an idea. Remembering the box of gold things in the now-burnt-down cabin (thanks to Roy's poor Molotov cocktail-throwing skills), Martin returns there and digs up the box, handing it over to Herzog. This seems to please the undead officer, and Martin makes his getaway. He reaches the cars and tries to start one, but notices a gold coin fall to the floor. Martin picks it up and slowly straightens to see Herzog outside the window. The Nazi officer smashes the window and reaches for Martin...and that's the end.

Dead Snow didn't totally blow me away. There were some moments that seemed like a stretch, but hey, if the purpose of the movie was to throw some crazy images, beautiful scenery, and wild zombie kills my way, then it succeeded. Unless I missed it, I would've liked to have a touch more of a hint as to how Herzog and his men became the undead. The ill-fated hiker mentioned the area had an "evil reputation," but that's not quite enough for me. I've been to some bars with an evil reputation, but didn't come out undead. Felt like it the next morning, though.

The acting was quite good and once you know who's who, you do grow attached to some characters. The scenery is gorgeous, but at the same time reminds you how isolated the area is. Herzog made for a menacing villain, with subtle facial expressions that gave him a definite air of evil. As if the Nazi uniform wasn't evil enough. And you can't totally fault a movie that has chainsaws, sledgehammers, and a friggin' machine gun snowmobile:



Those of you in a winter state, use that as a manual to deal with the undead outside your shelter gates.

See you next time, survivors!