Zombie (1979)

Alternate Names: Island of the Living Dead, Zombi 2, Zombie Flesh Eaters

Director: Lucio Fulci

Writer: Walter Patriarca, Elisa Briganti

Tagline: When the earth spits out the dead, they will rise to suck the blood of the living!

Actors: Tisa Farrow, Ian McCulloch, Richard Johnson, Al Cliver, Auretta Gay, Stefania D'Amario, Olga Karlatos

Runtime: 1h 31m

Category: Zombie

Synopsis: A derelict ship wonders into a New York bay and is searched by the police. They find nothing...except a zombie locked in a closet below the deck! The zombie bites one of the policemen and is then quickly disposed of. The daughter of the owner of the ship is notified and comes searching for her father. She tells police that her father had been away for some time doing research on an island in the Antillies. Believing that something is not right with the situation, the daughter, Anne, along with a local reporter, find Brian and Susan, a local couple who just happened to be setting sail and heading in the same direction as the island Anne's father was working on. How convenient. They get hit by a shark and the boat becomes dead in the water and they just happened to make it to Matoob, the island they were looking for. They all get out and find Anne's father's accomplice, Dr. Menard. He informs them of the work they have been doing and that the locals believe that a voodoo curse has been set upon the island. The dead are coming to life! The doctor had been running experiments on the infected, trying to figure out a cure. While Menard's wife is being eaten alive at their house a few miles away, Anne and her party find a graveyard built by the Spanish Conquistadors some 400 years ago. The buried start to come to life just as Anne and the reporter start to get fresh with each other. Three make it back to the doctor's hospital and it eventually get overrun. Anne, the reporter, and Brian make it back out to sea but Brian dies from being bitten by Susan after she had been zombified. The reporter turns on the radio and they hear that New York has been overrun by zombies. The world is about to end!

Review: Apart from the bad syncing, I thought it was pretty good for a 79' flick. The blood was nice and the make-up, for the time, wasn't bad. Some of the special effects were nice...like the wood through the eye...and the acting wasn't that bad. The part I liked the most was when the Conquistadors started coming to life. For some reason that whole scene was just chilling. Them slowly coming out of the ground, and the dirt falling off their faces, revealing their grotesque appearance was simply cinematic beauty. The bite scenes weren't bad and the blood was well done; not that ketchup-looking crap you see in B movies. I didn't like the voodoo side of the story, I never have. I prefer the infection side. Anyway I thought it was well done and a pretty good 70's horror flick.

Rating: 18. I liked the movie, overall, but it was a bit slow getting going. Even though the first couple minutes are cool, it takes some time to get going again. The last...oh...20-30 minutes of the movie were the absolute best. I enjoyed it, but it could have been faster paced (I don't like down time). If you ever want to see a classic zombie film, Lucio Fulci's Zombie is a must, especially for zombie fans. (18of25).