Who says I'm not easily pleased?
First up prepare to visit the.....
Island of the Living Dead (AKA L'Isola dei morti viventi. 2006)
Dir: Bruno Mattei (as Vincent Dawn)
Cast: Yvette Yzon, Franco Miguel, James L. Gaines Sr, Ronald Russo, Ydalia Suarez, Alvin Anson, Gary King Roberts, Curtis Carter and Thomas Wallwort.
Many years ago on a mysterious Spanish ruled island a group of (strangely Filipino looking) Conquistadors are having a wee bit of bother with the witch doctor and his chums.
You see, it seems that as soon as a member of the party/locals/traveling salesmen and the like dies they immediately come back to live as pasty faced angry zombie/vampire/general undead things.
The forts soldiers are having the worst of it tho', seeing as they've got the incredibly monotonous job of piling the corpses onto the back of a wagon just to see them re-animate and wander off again.
Slightly annoyed by this turn of events, the islands captain decides it'd be much easier to shoot them in the head and set fire to them. Which would be great if one of his overzealous pals hadn't decided to torch the curtains too.
Confused whether to be more afraid of the undead hordes outside or the chance of burning to death the entire garrison of terrorized soldiers flee....running straight into a band of sword wielding, undead pirates.
Is your hair all you let down when you have a drink?
Meanwhile, back in 'the modern times' the good ship Dark Star (a very expensive salvage/research vessel cunningly disguised as an old tug) and it's hearty crew are busy combing the ocean floor for treasure.
And just as they're about to give up and go home for tea the team's pocket sized scientist Sharon (yumsome Yvette Yzon) announces that sees located a huge treasure chest full of loot.
All is going swimmingly until the crew begin to raise the chest and pop it on board. After a flying start the bottom drops out causing all the gold and glittery stuff to go cascading back into the sea.
Discouraged and a little disheartened, they decide to crack open a beer and break out the Pringles before heading home, but there's even more bad luck on the horizon....a spooky mist envelops the vessel forcing it to run aground on a mysterious, uncharted island.
The ships drink sozzled captain, the unfortunately named Kirk (the gone to seed David McCallum lookalike that is Sir Ronald of Russo), decides that they'd better explore whilst Max the bubble permed engineer (Wallwort) stays on board to drink Lilt and shout at the engines.
I wouldn't want that swimming
up my arse....but then again...
Arriving on a deserted beach the crew decide to split up and explore. Sexy Sharon, tubby George Galloway wannabe Mark (Roberts) plus the hulking, bleached blond (and oh so slightly fey) Tao (Miguel) will go and search for food and water, whilst the ever more tipsy Captain Kirk, cool guy Fred (Anson, looking like the long lost son of Erik Estrada), shouty and permanently pre-menstrual Victoria (pouting, poppy eyed popstrel Suarez) and superbad mo-fo Snoopy (Gaines) go looking for other stuff.
Making their way thru' the thick jungle vegetation (oh OK then, a local kiddies adventure playground) Sharon and co. stumble across an old an old cemetery (as well as their dialogue) shrouded in the same ghostly fog that enveloped the ship before it ran aground...and slowly lurching out of the mist towards them is a shambling figure that may have once been a man....
"Aaarrgghhh...this isn't what I meant
by taking me up the casino!"
Sharon, ever the helpful one, decides to stand perfectly still till the approaching putrefying tramp gets close enough to grapple her to the ground (perhaps she likes a bit of rough?) thus giving Mark ample time to trip over a gravestone and scream for help.
Luckily Tao is a champion kick boxer who's been itching for a fight since they arrived on the island, so he's more than happy to jump in and fight the undead groper whilst his two colleagues leg it to safety and leave him to get bitten to death.
Friends eh?
Elsewhere on the island, captain Kirk (I'm sorry, but it makes me laugh just typing it) and his merry band have discovered the overgrown ruins of the Spanish outpost.
Taking tentative steps into the dark, dank interior, Fred manages to go crashing thru the floor and end up in a torture chamber (as one does) full of joke shop skeletons and pound shop candles.
The room also contains a mysterious book, bound in pigs ear and inked in Crayola. Kirk, showing off reads a few pages, pointing at the illustrations and making animal noises as he goes.
it appears that the book is about the dead coming back to life and devouring the living...
Been done, hasn't it?
Beware the binmen!
Back on board the boat, Max is onto his twelfth can of pop and passing gas like a steam engine as his vain attempts to repair the engines by rubbing them whilst shouting abuse at anyone within earshot (i.e. himself mainly) comes to nothing.
Hearing a banging on deck as well as noticing a faint whiff of cabbage mixed with stale urine he assumes that Kirk has come back to check up on his progress, so as you would imagine, Max is rather surprised when a gaggle of undead Spaniards start tottering down the engine room steps toward him licking their stringy lips in anticipation.
Understandibly he begins to panic and, whilsy attempting to escape accidentally hits the 'blow the ship up' lever.
"Ron Resrie!"
The resulting explosion brings everyone running back to the shore just in time to see what looks like a giant paper replica of the Dark Star sink slowly beneath the waves, leaving the brave crew trapped on a zombie infested island as night draws in.
Kirk and co. must find a safe haven for the night if they're to survive on this mysterious, undead filled island.....
Whilst most directors gave up on the zombie horror genre after the bubble burst in the late eighties, Mattei decided to soldier on, hoping to top his magnum opus Zombie Creeping Flesh.
This dream took him from his native homeland of Italy to the temperate jungles of the Philippines via the guerrilla realm of digital video technology.
And the results were well worth the plane fees.
With it's wafer thin plot, copious amounts of stock footage and rough edged special effects, Island of the Living Dead resurrects the golden age of the shlock horror zombie genre, dragging it kicking and screaming into the digital age.
And it seems nothing has changed except the ethnicity of the actors involved.
But trust me, dear reader when I tell you that this is, in fact, a good thing.
Featuring zombies mixed with an ample helping of vampirism, Voodoo and a snatch of flamenco dancing, Mattei bravely sticks to what he does best, which of course is churning out no-budget horror 'epics' whose plots are straining to hold out with the miniscule budgets involved.
Which goes to prove once and for all that God does indeed love a tryer.
orange t shirt restraining them) ham it up for the camera.
Worth a looksie for the first appearance of latter day Mattei muse Yvette Yzon (star of the sequel Zombies: The Beginning and Anima Persa) alone, Island of the Living Dead is an off coloured, moss stained gem of a movie, worthy of a place in the tarnished crown of Italian undead epics.
Unless you've been force fed a diet of Zac Snyder/Rob Zombie remakes when frankly you shouldn't even be wasting my time reading this.
Go on, treat yourself today.
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