I Watch 'Em So You Don't Have To

CHECK YOUR BRAIN AT THE DOOR






Retardead (2008)

Probably the biggest horror aspect of this movie is that it is a sequel. I'm not gonna even tell you what the FIRST one was called. I had to check and see if this was a Troma film but nope - just a wannabe. Not that this film could even begin to be taken seriously anyway and I WAS looking for something brainless to just go over the major details without too much thinking and I haven't done a zombie movie in a while. Got a ton of 'em on the list, just... I dunno. 

The Walking Dead kind of killed my interest in watching lame zombie movies. Not saying it's the best mind you but well... it's pretty far up there. There IS a reason it keeps breaking viewer records you know. And it's not just about Daryl Dixon. Well, a lot of it is. Okay half of it is.

Anyway back to our very VERY low budget and really no script movie that if you think it's making fun of the mentally challenged, back up 'cause you're not getting the point. The evil Dr. Stern, an established character of the first, um, movie is back and working on the Algernon 9 Project. If you don't know who Algernon was, pick up a book. He decides to work his evil intentions at the Butte County Institute For Special Education (yes folks, we're back in Georgia). 

He starts with a group of adult unfortunates and soon our cookie smearing, nose picking group are solving complicated equations and creating art (okay not art but better than I could ever draw) but then the side effects kick in - mainly they get really bad makeup jobs (these zombies are blue) and he has to chain them up in the basement.

There's a side story (several actually) - one is that a little girl is telling the story to her dad (sort of a reverse Princess Bride thing), another is the chase is on for a guy with a particularly nasty habit (not going into that one either). So the hapless police of Butte County are left to deal with people munchers until of course the CDC in Atlanta, and then FEMA get involved (which always involves a lot of non-action and we-don't-give-a-damn attitude about the people, you know, kind of like in real life) and so the town is closed off.

There isn't anything enlightening about this movie. It's also not particularly funny but it did have some moments. In the beginning you get a flash of times past being at the drive-in, watching the horribly mangled films of concession treats, and then movies coming - which usually looked better than what you were actually there to watch. When I was in high school we lived right across the street from a drive-in so I got to watch that quite a lot - I really do miss it. The movies previewed here are called Frankenstein And The Bloody Beast Of Ghastly Terror, and of course the classic Dracula VS. Jack The Ripper. Great stuff. Who knows, could be...

Anyway don't expect a whole lot of anything happening for a long time. You don't see a (blue) zombie until 44 minutes into the movie and the first kill a few minutes later. Then they get out the standard zombie movie kit that's probably available in any Zombies-R-Us store which includes buckets of cherry jello (in liquid form) for blood, nice rubber ropes for the required intestine scene, and hey, they must have bought the bonus package 'cause we even have a head with a spinal cord attached (which the unfortunate zombie-playing extra was asked to munch on). 

Other than that, there was a mass wound scene which, being a former EMT looked like they just horned in on somebody's triage exercise, one of those 'kiss your ass goodbye' announcements on the radio saying grab every weapon you can (they included rocket launchers and scorpions among other things).

Then after an hour the police bring the evil doctor to his warehouse and... what the bloody hell? The soundtrack almost completely cuts out - even with close captioning (which I've gotta have even in the best circumstances) I could barely make out what they were saying. Worse yet, the obvious auto body shop with the single table in the middle they were using was obviously right by the train tracks because instead of talking, about all you could hear was a bunch of trains going by, whistles blowing. They couldn't wait a half hour or so for them to go by? Really?

One small funny or SALTS (smiled a little then stopped) was the doctor's expert 'solution' to all the zombies. See, you take a gun, put in a bullet, and then shoot them in the head. You hear that Ms. Feinstein? If there's more than six zombies, you've just killed us all with your attempt at forcing us all to become unarmed. Another was when the smart woman (there's always one) complained she had to shoot kids and old people - she wasn't sure the old people were zombies but they moved so slow she couldn't take the chance...

Things end very slowly - first we get Zombie girl calendar action as some scantily clad ones dance around the doctor before reducing him to a skeleton, then they use up the rest of their cherry jello on the sad extras who were probably told, 'Okay this is what we want you to do. Stand against the wall, we're gonna spray you with this jello, flinch and then fall down, okay?'

 Does it even have an ending? Uh yeah, they rip off South Park's zombie episode when we find out that whatever is turning people into munchers will simply wear off within 48 hours and the bloodied law enforcement who just slaughtered dozens of people just look at each other and say 'oops'. And there were credits and two dedications to dead dudes. That's about it.