The Video Dead
A hokey premise (a tv acts as a gateway for murderous zombies), a cast full of terrible amateurs, some inspired gore gags and an admittedly phenomenal poster all add up to a pretty crappy movie with a few (very few) standout moments.
Everything is very inconsistent, from the tone (I think it's going for intentional laughs at times, but I can't be too sure) to the makeup (there are a few genuinely disturbing-looking ghouls, and then there's one who looks like David Bowie coated with a thick layer of Colgate Total).
The one thing that is consistent: the performances are uniformly awful. There's more than one victim who appears to be laughing as they're meeting their demise, one can only assume that second takes were not an option. Also, the guy playing the "Quint" (his name was Joshua in this one, but all the phony-tough monster-hunter characters in these movies are always just trying to be Robert Shaw) was apparently hired through Rent-A-Joe-Don-Baker. I believe he was the economy model.
While yesterday's movie, TerrorVision, had a similar premise, it was stuffed with imagination, color, life, and even a touch of satire. The Video Dead reaches for nothing of the sort. You would think television = zombies could lead to something satirical or witty (even if it was hacky & obvious like in the John Herzfeld joint 15 Minutes) or even (heaven forbid) scary, but this movie isn't interested in any of that. The tv might as well have been any given doorway, the movie does nothing with the premise.
Side note: the only name I recognized in the credits was one of the zombies who was played by Anthony Ferrante, a former makeup guy who is now best known as the director of both goddamn Sharknado movies. I assume this is precisely where he honed those chops.
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