Wicked Little Things (2006)

***Tobe Hooper was originally set to direct this movie when it was called Zombies. J.S. Cardone stepped up to the role and took over as director***

Alternate Titles: The Children, Zombies

Director: J.S. Cardone

Writer: Jace Anderson, Adam Gierasch, Ben Nedivi

Tagline: Prey for them

Actors: Lori Heuring, Scout Taylor-Compton, Chloe Moretz, Geoffrey Lewis, Ben Cross, Chris Jamba, Julie Rogers, Craig Vye

Runtime: 1h 34m

Category: Horrorfest, Revenge, Slasher, Zombie

Synopsis: A family of three moves into an abandoned family house after the death of the father. The mother, Karen, and her two daughters, Sarah and Emma, are trying to make it in the small town of Carlton. But Carlton holds an evil secret. In the beginning of the twentieth century, the Carlton Mine was in full excavation. Since some of the areas were too small for the adults to crawl though, they hired children to help work the mines. During a dig, an explosive charge was detonated, killing all of the children inside. Now, many years later, they have come back to seek their revenge on the bloodline that killed them. Now on the run from the zombified children, Karen and Sarah must find a way to stop the onslaught before they become the next victims. But how can you stop what’s already dead?

Review: I was not as thrilled to see this movie as I was some of the other Horrorfest films. But I was kinda surprised by it. I thought that the story was pretty good, apart from having copious amounts of similarities to Lars von Trier’s The Kingdom (1994). But there are also many differences, of which will not be listed because I really don’t want to get into it, so piss off! Anyway, the story was, as I said before, pretty good with some nice plotlines and a good solid background. Some movies have a great story with a crappy background, making it unbearable to watch. But this one had a nice solid background with enough information to sustain until more info was given at proper plot-points.

The acting was not too bad. With some relatively unknown and some other slightly well known actors I was pleasantly surprised. I thought that they did a good job portraying their characters and made them mostly believable. I was actually not expecting too much in the way of acting considering I am always caution concerning new-comers. But I thought that they did pretty good…good enough to make the story believable. And that’s all you really need, all of the rest comes later.

The gore was the best part of the movie. Throughout the movie there are scenes of zombie children tearing apart and eating living things; from human to animal. Some of the “slasher” scenes were slightly over exuberant for their context, but they were well done all the same. But my favorite part of the whole movie was at the end: when the blood from “you know who” starts dripping down from the attic in the barn onto Karen, Sarah, and Mr. Hanks. It was very reminiscent of Stephen King’s Carrie (1976). But just the way the blood flowed down onto them and the looks on their faces was just priceless. I think that that scene will become one of my favorite blood scenes of all time.

Rating: 17. Although I liked the movie, and it had a few brilliant scenes in it, it just seemed to parallel The Kingdom (1994). For those of you who do not know what that is, Stephen King presented a “made for TV” series called, Kingdom Hospital (2004), based on Lars von Trier’s book/movie. That review will be coming later. I mean right down to the name of the dead girl, the similarities were astounding. I’m not saying that the writers and producers copied Trier’s work but they are just so similar. Apart from that, the movie moved a bit slow and I found myself getting hungry. I had actually contemplated pausing the movie (something I HATE to do), and making myself a sandwich. I think it was because the story didn’t suck me in as much as I would have liked it to. But it was altogether a good movie and not to be discounted. (17of25).