ZMD: Zombies of Mass Destruction

The most influential of all independent filmmakers is not Quentin Tarantino, but George A. Romero, who, with his Living Dead films (Night of the, Dawn of the, Day of, Land of and Diary of, with more to follow) has established the go-to metaphor for low budget filmmakers, that being a zombie standing in for the mindless members of the human race who conform to society’s rules, no matter which way they turn. The “zombie as society” idea has been worn down so much that there was already a successful parody of the genre (parodying a satire is already a questionable premise), with Edgar Wright’s Shaun of the Dead.

So for director Kevin Hamedani and his ZMD: Zombies of Mass Destruction, the danger isn’t just in repeating Wright’s jokes, but also Peter Jackson’s in Braindead, the Spierig brothers’ Undead, or any comedic film that features flesh eaters in a small town, even if they happen to be animals, such as Jonathan King’s Black Sheep. And while Hamedani doesn’t get too creative with the over-the-top gore, he throws in enough unsubtle political jabs at American society to differentiate ZMD from a slew of very low-budget zombie movies. It is also a nice touch that two of the heroes, Tom, an uptight former townie coming back to come out to his conservative mother, and Lance, his overtly obvious boyfriend, are not reduced to simply sexual creatures, though there are some good jokes at the expense of the intolerant (ex-gay =zombie).

The small-town America as a representative of what most Americans really think (safely avoiding indicting the audience, since the utopian world presented doesn’t exist in reality), while an obvious idea, gives Hamedani the opportunity to take shots at xenophobia (immigrants = aliens = zombies) and post 9/11 fear, and an easy nudge or two at religion. This results in some moderately clever dialogue such as when an Iranian teen is being interrogated by your garden variety redneck and she answers his jingoistic questions correctly, which raises his suspicion because “most American high school students wouldn’t know that.” In reality, ZMD is quite a badly acted mess, but that’s not always a negative in the horror-comedy realm, and it’s at least more coherent and less pretentious than Bruce LaBruce’s recent Otto: or Up With Dead People, which similarly plays with the gay zombie idea. LaBruce never knew whether he was making fun of his own film or whether he meant it, and while Hamedani has not managed to focus on any of his targets, whether it is towards the church or within the political realm, he knows how to entertain. Perhaps as a nod to his limitations, Hamedani has Lance say to Tom’s mother to assuage her homophobia, “if it’s any consolation, he’s a top.”

Zombies of Mass Destruction will be shown at QFest, The 15^th Philadelphia International Gay and Lesbian Film Festival. The festival will run from July 9^th_20^th and will show more than 100 gay-themed films. You can read more at QFest.com.

If you would like to read more of Adam Lippe’s reviews, you can find them at RegrettableSincerity.com.

0 readers like this post.

I like this post.