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Braindead

Braindead (1993)

February. 12,1993
|
7.5
|
R
| Horror Comedy

When a Sumatran rat-monkey bites Lionel Cosgrove's mother, she's transformed into a zombie and begins killing (and transforming) the entire town while Lionel races to keep things under control.

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jamesgandrew
1993/02/12

A group of adventurers discover and bring back a deadly rat monkey to a zoo, who can transform their victims into blood thirsty zombies. When a man's mother gets accidentally bitten by the rat monkey, mayhem ensues. Dead Alive, also known as Braindead, was Peter Jackson's third feature after the splatter fest Bad Taste and crude Muppet parody Meet the Feebles. Jackson this time delivers a humorous take on the zombie genre, which harkens to the likes of Sam Raimi's The Evil Dead in its combination of physical comedy with blood and guts galore. Dead Alive is said to be the bloodiest movie of all time and I'm not exaggerating! One of the final sequences required 5 gallons of blood to be pumped out per second! That's absolutely ludicrous! Thankfully it pays off and the film remains one of the greatest zombie comedies of all time.Timothy Balme excellently pulls off the wild physical comedy and in all honesty, he is a runner up for Bruce Campbell in terms of giving the best performance in a zombie horror comedy. There are some insanely over the top moments and you just have to see it for yourself- they're insanely good! Dead Alive/Braindead is over the top violent gory fun that I'm sure you'll enjoy!

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RaspberryLucozade
1993/02/13

Five years after Peter Jackson's blood splattering hit 'Bad Taste' churned the stomachs of cinema goers, the young director went even further down the gore route and came up with 'Braindead' ( known in North America as 'Dead Alive' ), set in 1950's New Zealand.It was disgusting to say the least. Not one moment goes by without gross, blood and gut letting violence going by. It was all about the life of a young mummy's boy whose life is turned upside down when his mother is transformed into a flesh hungry zombie. Lionel Cosgrove is a well mannered, well intentioned though dim witted and spineless young man who has not yet managed to break himself free from the apron strings of his malicious, conniving mother Vera.Eventually, Lionel strikes up a relationship with beautiful Spanish shopkeeper Paquita and one day takes her on a day out to the zoo where a hideously deformed creature known as a rat monkey is known to reside. Lionel soon discovers his mother is spying on him and Paquita when she stumbles against the cage containing the deadly animal which bites her.The venom from the bite causes Vera to mutate into a zombie. Eventually, Vera's appetite for human flesh spirals out of control and before long all of the city has become overrun by the undead.'Braindead' is certainly not one of the best comedy films around, it's not even great but it is fun, if sick and vile. The acting is nothing too special ( apart from Elizabeth Moody, who played Lionel's nasty mother ) but for a film like this that is probably to be expected. Timothy Balme, who played Lionel, more recently has appeared in the dreadful New Zealand drama 'The Almighty Johnsons'. Diana Peñalver, who played Paquita, I suspect was hired for her looks alone and not her acting ability.The funniest moments in the film included a slowly zombifying Vera trying to host a dinner party which ends in gory disaster, a zombie priest and zombie nurse having sex and giving birth to a baby zombie, a female zombie having her head impaled on an active light bulb thus alighting her head like a Halloween lantern and the zoo keeper announcing to Lionel and Paquita that the rat monkey creature came into existence after a plague of rats raped all the tree monkeys of Skull Island. Only the scene at the end where Lionel massacres the zombies with a lawn mower doesn't work. I personally found it horribly overdone.Whilst the special effects used for their time would have been pretty impressive, I suspect now they probably wouldn't stand the test of time. As I said previously, 'Braindead' may not be great, but it is still fun.

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thepigsoftheroundtable
1993/02/14

Once in a life time there comes a movie that combines two opposite genres together to make a seamless whole of a movie. Dead Alive is that movie. Perfectly combining splatter horror, and comedy this movie is sure to make you laugh and vomit at the same time. The premise is simple, an awkward young man's mom is bitten by a Rat Monkey that leads to her becoming a zombie. Eventually she gets out and begins to spread the disease around the neighborhood. Basically you classic zombie movie. But this has a completely different feel to it. For one I couldn't stop laughing, whether is was the zombie baby or the heart and lungs monster, this movie made me laugh. But at the same time I completely lost my appetite. From watching a man get his legs eaten off, or a woman eat her own ear. It really takes a certain kind of person to understand the humor in this movie. I give this movie ten out of ten, not just for the humor and story but for the practical effects. They were absolutely amazing. A few like the monkey or the baby don't really hold up to today's standards, but when the guy gets his legs eaten away leaving just his bones, that was unbelievable. It looked so realistic. The characters were another way that made this movie great. I really enjoyed the characters, they were all people that really acted like someone would in that type of situation making it believable.I wouldn't recommend this movie to just any movie watcher. It takes a special type of person to enjoy this movie to it's full potential. But if you love movies like Shaun of the Dead or Zombieland I suggest you check this movie out. But do it on an empty stomach, I cannot stress how bloody and gory this movie is.

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videorama-759-859391
1993/02/15

He's finally done it. Jackson has finally created something that is a gore fest and a half, the last half hour, almost non stop with it. Whereas Bad Taste was cheap and had repulsive gore, was slightly funny, where in between this were some long stretches of boredom, and was just plain stupid, here Jackson has made a much smarter film of better quality, where so far, this was his best. Braindead is a romantic horror tale, where boy introduces girlfriend to mother, where they make the dreaded mistake of going to the zoo. The mother is bitten by a Samutrian Rat, something I'd never wanna be bitten by, especially if the rat was infected, as I can recall. As to how this horribly ensues, all I can say, is strap in for one hell of a zombie fest, no holds barred, and I'm talking buckets of the stuff. High level horror fans won't be disappointed as Jackson has really shown what he's capable of with this mainstream, pre Lord Of The Rings, pic. Trivia note: Braindead took two years to hit video shelves.

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