“The Walking Dead” is one of the finest graphic novels ever written; “The Walking Dead” on AMC is boring — and sanctimonious. For any other show it would be the kiss of death, but television’s “Dead” can count on a constituency of zombie lovers that will keep coming back, no matter how brain-dead the writing is.

Let’s face it: The writers are screwing it up — and after two seasons, we conservatives have lost patience.

Let’s address some of the criticisms that my conservative friends are making regrading the show. These are fair at times but often miss the point, because they seek to compare TWD to the films of zombie lore. In so doing, these critics misunderstand the purpose of Robert Kirkman’s “The Walking Dead” graphic novel.

It’s about the people, not the creatures.

Spoilers Ahead …

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The broader strokes of the internecine conflict on AMC’s “The Walking Dead” have already been covered on Big Hollywood, but plenty of room has been left for detail.

Sunday’s episode of TWD left me with a bad taste in my mouth. For one, it took the band of survivors (henceforth, “the Gang”) for a stroll down a series of pulse-deadening subplots that I imagine did things like “develop characters” and “heighten drama” and “purge the crap out of some emotions” without involving any, you know, actual zombies. Nary a flesh feast to be seen in 45 minutes.

And while the conspicuous dearth of shotguns being primed for battle disappointed a blood-and-guts zombie aficionado like myself, it was something else that frustrated me most about the episode.

It shouldn’t be news to Big Hollywood readers that television writers are people of the left. If it is news to you, then you’ve got some catching up to do, Rip.

The writers of TWD are no different, and they have been quick to let us know that throughout the show via this season’s suicidal gun policy and the overriding caricaturing of conservatives (on a side note, this caricaturing extends even to the show’s “webisode” mini-series, as seen here and here).

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There’s a major split on the conservative scene that threatens to tear us apart, and we need to confront the issue head-on. No, it isn’t the Romney vs. a Conservative fight – let’s face it, we’re all going to vote for whoever wins the nomination. Hell, I’d vote for my terrier before I let this crew get another four years.  And my terrier is a terrier.

No, the great conflict I speak of is the schism between those of us who believe ‘The Walking Dead’ is great television and those of us who haven’t felt this level of disappointment in something they desperately wanted to support since John McCain got the nomination.

The premiere of the second season has scored boffo ratings, and Big Hollywood’s own Christian Toto has recently eloquently stated the pro-’Walking Dead’ case here. Many people love the show.  Can all these people be wrong?  Yes, and it gives me no pleasure to say so.

The fact is that ‘TWD’ is annoying, liberalish, and frustrating. It was last year as well, as I pointed out at length here at Big Hollywood (‘The Walking Dead: Populated With Racist Southerners, Dumb Characters‘). Testifying to the level of interest was the fact that it received over 400 comments, mostly questioning my taste, intellect and parental marital status.

People love zombie stories – I love zombie stories – and no one wants ‘TWD’ to fail. But the problem is that in the second season it seems to be going down the same dead end road as in the first season – except faster. (more…)

With the second season of AMC’s ‘The Walking Dead’ returning this week, I’d like to recommend a different kind of zombie movie. The 2008 film ‘Pontypool’ is more of a psychological thriller akin to Hitchcock’s ‘The Birds’ than a pure zombie feature. And if you love zombies, talk radio or smart horror films, this one’s for you.

THERE BE SPOILERS BELOW. . . and braaaaaains!

Based on the Tony Burgess novel ‘Pontypool Changes Everything’ and inspired by Orson Welles’s radio broadcast of ‘The War of the Worlds,’ ‘Pontypool’ combines two modern crazes – talk radio and zombies. The film centers around Grant Mazzy (Stephen McHattie), a shock jock who lost his job in the big city for pushing things a little too far.

Mazzy has a new job in the small town of Pontypool, Ontario, where he and his producer Sydney Briar (Lisa Houle) clash over the best way to run his broadcasts. As they argue their way through his first broadcast, they start getting reports of a riot at a local doctor’s office. The nature of the riot is unclear as the rioters seem to be shouting gibberish about the disappearance of Honey the cat. Soon, the reports get more ominous until the radio broadcasters themselves come under attack.

‘Pontypool’ differs from other zombie movies because it disdains what has become the standard undead formula. Almost without exception, the films involve a small group of people trapped by zombies forced to shoot their way to safety. These films invariably turn into gross-out fests and shooting galleries almost from the opening scene. ‘Pontypool’ doesn’t. You don’t even see a zombie for a long time, and you never see a gun. Instead, you watch Mazzy and his staff of two (Sydney and Laurel Ann) struggle to make sense of what is going on based on the sketchy reports they are getting. And it is gripping! (more…)

Those shuffling, oozing “walkers” are back on AMC, and that’s heartening news for horror junkies looking for a fix this Halloween season.

Last year’s debut of ‘The Walking Dead’ proved the small screen was just the right size for an undead miniseries. Season two, which begins with a 90-minute episode at 9 p.m. EST tonight, confirms those initial six episodes were no aberration. This is seriously good horror, the kind that doesn’t require gallons of fake blood to grab our attention.

Not that ‘Dead’ skimps on the gore, mind you. It’s got cinema-level effects to go along with the addictive story lines. The behind-the-scenes squabbling during the production of season two – ‘Dead’ showrunner Frank Darabont left the series abruptly – hasn’t dampened the creativity behind this undead jamboree.

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Sorry, George, but your zombies have been served by a little ol’ TV show.

Zombies have been shuffling across movie screens for decades in films like ‘I Walked with a Zombie’ and ‘The Last Man on Earth.’ But director George A. Romero gave the genre new, er, life with his 1968 classic ‘Night of the Living Dead.’

Romero is still making zombie movies, but they lack the bite of his best shockers like ‘Dawn of the Dead.’ His ‘Diary of the Dead’ was a well intentioned but clumsy attempt to fuse the genre with ‘Blair Witch’ style found footage. And ‘Survival of the Dead,’ with its laughable Hatfield-McCoy feud, should have been put out of its misery before reaching movie theaters.

A great zombie story demands more than masticated human flesh. And that’s where AMC’s ‘The Walking Dead’ comes in.

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Run for your lives! It’s October, the unofficial horror movie month! Horror is consistently one of the most popular genres in film, with even middling movies guaranteed to make money. Why? Because audiences want to feel emotion from their entertainment, and no emotion is easier to evoke than fear.

Fear comes in many forms, everything from being startled to deep psychological terror. Few movies reach that final level, but when they do they leave a scar on our culture. With that in mind, let’s talk about the twenty most significant horror films. These aren’t necessarily the best or the most scary or even my favorites, but when you die . . .  these will be on the test.

Father Merrin had come to save Regan from Satan’s fluorescent lightbulbs.

1. Night of the Living Dead (1968): The importance of this film cannot be overstated. This film brought horror movies to adult audiences. Before ‘Dead,’ horror was costumed monsters aimed at kids. The film also kick-started the zombie craze which continues unabated today in film and within the Democratic party, and it established all the conventions for the zombie subgenre. “Yes we can . . . yes we can.”

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***Update: Much more on the game, including screenshots, at NRO.

We all know who fantasizes and encourages violence. If it’s not just a guy in Obama’s neighborhood it’s a guy introducing Obama or unions or disturbing stuff like this:

It’s the Left.

Liars in the world of entertainment will tell you that what happens on screen has no real-world effect. Which is why corporations spend billions every year using visual mediums to get people to change their behavior through advertising.

You know, because it has no effect.

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I’m a mom with a full-time job and two dogs, so spending $75 on a babysitter and a couple of movie tickets so I can take a nap in a dark theater is not my idea of a good time.  Television isn’t much better.  I anxiously awaited HBO’s The Pacific only to be given a selective recollection of World War II as seen through a post-9/11 prism.  Then there was AMC’s The Walking Dead. It really had me up until the final episode’s waning moments when a member of the CDC explained that, when it came to the Zombie Apocalypse, the French scientists were the picture of courage while the Americans cried like babies.  Yeah, right.  The reanimated dead are walking the earth?  Okay, fine.  But the world’s foremost country in waving the white flag is now the paragon of bravery?  That’s a bridge too far.

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Since 2010 only got me out to the movies twice (that I can remember) to see The Town and The Social Network, the internet became one of my main forms of entertainment.  That was where I found Drinking with Bob. Sure, he looks a little angry, but so am I.  However, thanks to Bob, I don’t need to get my blood pressure to the boiling point; he’s here to do it for me.  I was starving for an alternative viewpoint.  Sick and tired of being distracted by liberal celebrities and their need for attention, I needed some meaning.  And strangely enough, Bob delivered.

Somewhere in between Facebook, Sean Hannity, and the occasional Tivo’d Red Eye, I found Bob’s rants.  His website and YouTube channel represent the reason the internet has become an alternative venue for entertainment for so many.  It doesn’t have any sponsors or politically correct audience to temper its intent or its delivery.  Sure there is a lot of crap, but when you come across a gem like Drinking with Bob, it makes it all worthwhile.  Each installment starts off with: “What’s next? I’ll tell you what’s next…” and then blasts off into a tirade over anything from the NFL cancelling a game due to snow to why he thinks Ben Affleck is a hypocritical d-bag.  He covers it all and no one is safe, especially President Obama and his nonsensical policies.  You know the ones that make you want to punch your own head, like spending millions on a census commercial during the Super Bowl?  (more…)

As the music giants stagger further into the wilderness bereft of their traditional sales tools, they continue to churn out tired, American Idol-inspired pop and rap records scooped up by suburban white boys who have never heard the Beatles.  Aided by industry suckerfish such as Entertainment Weekly and Rolling Stone, they tout their latest officially sanctioned “edgy” release.  Here’s Eminem with another bowl of anger.  Must be hard to stay so angry with all that money.  Here’s Christina Aguilera—or is it Lady Gaga—with another incisive critique of hypocrisy.  Only country music is expanding, due  to, perhaps, country’s insistence on singing about things that matter.

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There is another world out there, young pop bands shunning the traditional channels and using the internet to sell their exquisitely crafted, gloriously melodic pop.  Twenty-ten was another banner year in which it was difficult to limit the top ten to only ten.  Nevertheless, here goes.

1. Oranjuly formed in 2009 joining lead singer and writer Brian E. King who had already been working on these songs for years.  Every year it seems a one-man band emerges to stun us.  In years past it’s been Roger Klug and Josh Fix.  This year it’s Oranjuly’s Brian E. King who says, “I played everything but drums and cello. I did play drums on South Carolina though!”  Now the band is a five piece so they can reproduce these astounding sounds in public.  This time the Jellyfish comparisons are apt.  King also has a knack for sunny Beach Boys-style harmonies which permeate the record.  If architecture is frozen music this is the Taj Mahal. (more…)

AMC’s Zombie series “The Walking Dead,” which concluded its first season last night, received (mostly) kudos from (mostly) liberal critics.  And some of this praise is deserved: The acting is first rate, and the show looks gorgeous – the directing, cinematography, and make-up are feature-film calibre, no question.
 
But the series also has some serious flaws, which critics seem loathe to mention.  The writing is uneven.  Some of the characters are disappointingly cliche and two-dimensional (the smart Asian kid, the redneck who beats his wife, etc). And some story points are way too obvious set-ups for way too obvious payoffs – when a character makes a big deal about it being her birthday at the beginning of the episode, you may rest assured she’s going to be Zombie chum at the end of that episode.

But perhaps most unforgivable is that for a zombie show, “The Walking Dead” features a surprising dearth of zombies. Except for the first few action-packed episodes, most of the series seems to consist of people talking about what they’re going to do if the zombies find them.  
 
So why such gushing praise from the critics?  Liberals love zombies, because they terrorize in the aggregate and lack individual will, volition and character, and so lend themselves easily to being used as a metaphor for any sort of large scale environmental, economic, or military catastrophe.  This allows the film-maker to engage in “social commentary” (lucky us), which liberal artists love to make more than art and liberal critics love to praise more than critique.  George Romero pioneered this approach with “Night of the Living Dead,” which used zombies to cast a light on race relations, and “Dawn of the Dead,” which satirized America’s mall-culture commercialism, among others. (more…)

It seems a bit odd that my three main objections to a graphic TV series about flesh-eating zombies is that it lacks realism, that its characters are hackneyed, and that it has too few flesh-eating zombies.  After all, it’s hardly a genre most folks associate with realism or complex characters and not having zombies seems to miss the point.  Our hopes were so high, but AMC’s The Walking Dead sadly does lack realism, falling into the usual horror film trap of forcing its characters to do stupid things for no better reason that it is necessary to propel the plot.  If stupid were money, these characters would be George Soros. 

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And the characters themselves are – in the classic critique offered by a thousand screenwriting teachers – less characters than caricatures.  The first real redneck we meet is a racist loudmouth.  As is the second.  And the third is, so far at least, just a wife beater, though I expect he’ll end up hating black people too.  This is no surprise.  To people who write for the entertainment industry, if you live east of I-5 and south of the Mason-Dixon, you’ve got a sheet and a flammable cross in the back of your pick-up and you could someday grow up to be a revered Democratic senator.

Oh, and there’s not enough zombie action.  Instead of flesh-eating terror, we get scenes of budding survival suffragettes complaining about having to do the laundry.  Seriously.  The little band of refugees can’t be bothered to set up the most basic security for the undefendable position they’ve chosen to occupy, but these walking, talking clichés have plenty of time to bicker about gender roles while scrubbing Dockers. (more…)

With Hallowmas upon us, I thought I would go over the reasons why I consider zombies to be the greatest monsters yet invented, a sort of grand synthesis of all of the best elements of previous fright-mongers. See if you agree, and offer your own opinions and counterarguments in the comments section below.

1. They’re anthropomorphic.

There’s all sorts of beasties under the sun (and moon), but in general I’ve always found that the creepier specimens are the ones which assail you while housed in a human body. Bruce the shark in Jaws, the Blob chasing a young Steve McQueen, or the wide assortment of killer piranhas, rats, and dinosaurs out there don’t hold a candle to things like vampires, werewolves, and zombies — monsters that retain aspects of their humanity even as they terrorize us with their doom-laden, inhuman fates.

2. They’re the living dead.

An adjunct to #1 above. Some monsters are nothing more than exotic animals, others demons associated with the netherworld of some ancient religion or mythology, and still others ordinary humans with a black nullity where their soul and conscience is supposed to be. All provide us with legions of good scares, and may they continue to do so! (more…)

It is with great satisfaction yet hoped-for humility that I feel myself obliged to introduce to BIG HOLLYWOOD a flowering expert on ZOMBIES.

His visit here is, perhaps, not entirely of his own free will.

Life and art, ahhhhh, art and life!

No, after researching Prof. Daniel Drezner’s background, the increasingly supportive and, I might add, impressive editor of BIG PEACE, Peter Schweizer, unearthed a few, very seminal facts about this gentleman and his hobby: ZOMBIES.

I myself have found that mixing my hobby of music with my profession of acting never fared well. Because I was allowed to play piano on film occasionally, given that indulgent pleasure by the director Larry Cohen, I was persuaded to do possibly too many shock shlock, vampire and monster films with him.

I, however, was, with only one exception, the hero! (more…)

There is a scene in the movie “The Crazies” where a couple of men investigate to see if there was a plane crash in the area. Instead of going for easy thrills (i.e. people popping out of dark places to frighten the characters), the scene builds up drama and then ends with a  creepy camera shot.  Unfortunately, unlike this particular scene, the movie often relies on quick and easy scares rather than building up tension and intelligent thrills. 

“The Crazies” revolves around a small community where a virus takes over the population. One of the first scenes in the movie shows a tranquil baseball game with the sheriff (Timothy Olyphant) in attendance. Out in the distance, a man walks onto the baseball field carrying a gun. A confrontation ensues between the sheriff and this seemingly drunk man and soon thereafter other people in town start acting strange. As more people begin acting out of character, the sheriff  investigates what caused this change in behavior and why people are acting like zombies.

For its scares, the movie often relies on “the crazies” popping out of places and scaring people. Wherever the characters go, there always seems to be someone hiding in a bedroom, in a kitchen and even (in a creative sequence) in a car wash. Unfortunately, this is part of the film’s problem. Instead of relying on interesting and original sequences, the plot just moves the characters from one setting to another where zombies appear from nowhere. (One wonders how long crazies stand in one place silently waiting for the lead characters to show up so that they can jump out and surprise them. Do crazies pay board games while they wait for potential victims?) (more…)

The payoff for sitting through a dozen craptacular releases is that one movie where you actually say, “Damn, that was worth the $11.50 and the kidney I spent to see it.”  As a modern moviegoer, you must be an eternal optimist.  You must hope against hope that the trailer you liked didn’t contain every single good scene and funny joke in the movie, and that the reviewer who raved isn’t covering up some pinko agenda that’ll make you choke out on your Goobers. 

You have to believe that out there somewhere is an action movie director who knows what a tripod is.  That there is a young lead actor who has never starred in a CW television series about beautiful but sensitive teenage male models with supernatural powers.  That there is a comedy screenwriter who can imagine a “funny” situation not involving a bodily fluid.  That Michael Cera will one day play a different character.

In that spirit, a spirit of Pollyannaish hope in the face of overwhelming evidence indicating that Hollywood’s product will almost certainly continue to demonstrate that evolution is a two-way street, I present ten movies that are coming within the next six months that might actually be good – or at least not make me throw things at the screen and slap around the ushers. (more…)

What is horror?

The word comes down to us from the Old Roman, horrere, which means literally “to stand on end” (as in hair) or “to shiver,” whether from fear or cold – Ovid refers to the “chill-bearing breath” of the North Wind (Metamorphosis, I.65).

Halloween is a unique holiday, marked for the celebration of the chill bearing, when demons and witches are allowed to come out to play and scare the bejezzus out of us – or at least, that’s how it used to be.

Over the last decade or so, Halloween has become less about creep and more about camp; Dracula and Frankenstein costumes replaced by Octomom and Obama masks (OK, those are more scary). What I want to do here is help those who would like go old school this year, and have a truly frightful All Hallows’ Eve.

(First suggestion – avoid bars. Like St. Patrick’s Day and New Year’s, Halloween brings out the amateur drinkers, a more loathsome species than any undead thing you may encounter. No, Halloween is best spent alone with someone special to snack on in the dark, with something scary to read, listen to, or watch.) (more…)

Filmmaker George Romero has had exactly one good idea in his life: the original, 1968 zombie film Night of the Living Dead. Since then, he has been coasting on a reputation as a maker of smarter than average horror films. Although he has made some good movies since Night of the Living Dead, few of his films have above par for the horror genre, and the average quality of horror films in the decades since his breakthrough movie is a very low bar to surpass. 

In particular, Romero has revisited the zombie film in quite a few movies over the years, usually providing the press with some serious intellectual/social/political commentary his latest film is supposed to make. So it is once again with his new film, the Venice Film Festival entry Survival of the Dead. Reuters reports that Romero, age 69, said his new film deals with questions about when it’s right to go to war:  (more…)

Yes, vampires are still a hot media commodity, but zombies are vying to knock them off the cultural pedestal, with the rise of zombie movies as a cultural force and numerous books about zombies hitting the stores, capped by the spoof novel Pride and Prejudice and Zombies having recently reached the top of the bestseller list. An article in the Chicago Tribune documents the phenomenon and suggests some reasons for it.

First the author suggests audience identification as the main factor: we are interested in zombies because according to the mythology, we could become them ourselves (should we die after being bitten by one):

“There’s a sadness,” said S.G. Browne. “They used to be us. But they’re tragic and comical and they want to be friends, but we run. Vampires are Brad Pitts. Zombies are more like the Steve Buscemis. We can relate.”

That natural sense of sympathy, however, conflicts with an even more fundamental urge: the drive to stay alive, as the latter absolutely requires that we kill every zombie we can find. That’s a rather poignant situation, and I think it does indeed account for some of the power of zombie stories. (more…)