Wednesday, April 13, 2016

Return of the Living Dead **1/2

The cult horror movie Return of the Living Dead will, I mean it totally will, send you on a time warp to 1985.  Dan O'Bannon, known for writing classic Sci-Fi movies like Dark Star and Alien, took the director's chair for this one and made one of the more offbeat horror movies of the decade.  The title itself suggests the film is a sequel to George Romero's 1968 horror classic Night of the Living Dead.  Yes and no.  As one character explains, Romero based his film on a true story and simply exaggerated the facts.  The movie begins in a medical equipment warehouse where the manager Frank (James Karen) explains to a new employee Freddy (Thom Matthews) they keep reanimated bodies in barrels, products of a wacky army experiment.  Frank and Freddy awaken the zombies and are forced take refuge in a mortuary (great setting for a horror movie). They are also joined by a group of punk rock kids. The punk soundtrack included songs from the The Cramps and The Damned.  Even the zombies talk and get down. Gallows humor all around. Watch it on a triple feature with An American Werewolf in London and Stephen King's Creepshow for an evening of retro horror. 

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