Night of the Zombies

[Master Blaster]

I bought this baby for $1.99 on good ol classic VHS. One of the worst of the worst zombie flicks to come out of Italy. A montage to plot holes, ripoffs, and bloopers. If you really love zombies, and really love crap movies, this one is for you. Deffinately a Plan 9 level of crappy, except without the charm.

[Eagle]

One of those movies you can´t take too serious. Its just the right footage for a video-party with lots of beer and potato-flips. Obviously a rip-off Romeros "Dawn of the Dead" with bad acting but funny to watch after all.

[Zack]

Also, I should mention that I saw this when an ex of mine and I purchansed this packaged together with "Rats: Night of Terror".  (at the time it was labeled as "Hell of the Living Dead") and we, being terrible fools and gluttons for punishment, watched them both...in a row.

Besides the fact that most of the costumes and all of the music is stolen from the much better "Dawn of the Dead" is still enjoyed this piece of crap on a "boy....I can't believe that just happened kind of way."  

also, who can forget the INSANE dialogue (probably from the words being meant to match the lips with no thought to content) we get to hear the crazy twitchy guy scream "Shift your ass or you'll get your balls wasted!!!!"

Gold Jerry, Gold.

[Zack]

Actually I think people mention the dawn of the dead rip off thing, cause they kind of all wear the same uniforms as the two heroes from DOTD and they kinda stole the soundtrack...I mean like the ENTIRE soundtrack.  like every piece of music in that movie is ripped right of romero's.  anyway, just sayin...

[TooManyZombies]

I'd heard plenty of bad reviews, including this one, before watching this movie, and I was prepared for the worst. But when this movie ended, my only thought was 'That was awesome'. Lots of zombies, lots of gore, pointless nudity, it's everything a zombie movie should be. The stock nature footage is annoying and stupid, sure. But I'd rather watch a fox eat a rabbit than I would the director's lame attempt to make me connect with the zombiebait (Although Santoro's one of my favorite zombie movie chracters of all time.)

I'd be interested to find out how many of the people who commented have actually seen this movie. For one, THIS IS NOT A DAWN OF THE DEAD RIP-OFF. DAWN OF THE DEAD DID NOT TAKE PLACE ON A TROPICAL ISLAND, NOR DID IT INVOLVE COMMANDOS. Honestly, aside from the fact it has zombies there's almost no similarity, and if being a zombie movie makes this a DotD rip-off, well I guess that makes every movie where a character wears shoes a Wizard Of Oz clone. Secondly, the 'Arrgh, why don't they shoot them in the head?' complain is a little, well, stupid to make, since Santoro yells at them 3 or 4 times for it in the movie.

This is better than Zombi 2. Believe it.

[M.G. SMITH]

 This is one of my favs. I saw this flick at the a Sepulveda Drive-in, San Fernando Valley Ca. on a Triple bill with "Dawn of the Dead" and "Gates of Hell". The night I saw this flick the valley was hit by a freak super storm. Lots of flooding, Few streetlights or traficlights were working. Most of the cities were without power. Some how I got my mom to take me [I think I was 11 0r 12] by convincing her the drive-in would have a back-up generator. They did. It took 2 1/2 hours to go what would normally take 30 minutes! I remember the Rem. 870 shotgun in the back seat just in case a riot or something broke out! I grew up at So-Cal drive-in"s, and this is one movie that brings back the memories. Night of the Zombies is a"GREAT" bad movie. When the Reporter goes "NATIVE" bouncing in front of the range rover, I knew was watching a GREAT trash film. Heck! The rain stopped as so as this flick started! You can get this flick on DVD under the title; Hell of the Living Dead. If you Flip the Paper jacket over it has the U.S. Release Title "Night of the Zombies"! Way Cool!!! See this movie! and Check out "Chosen Survivors" [There's Bats in the Bomb Shelter! In the name of Bradford Dillman SAVE US!]while your at it!

[Goreign]

Is it me, or does this movie smack of ripoff? I saw this piece of trash when i was a kid and even then it seemed like a ripoff of Return of The Living Dead. A noxious gas turns plant workers into zombies? Eh? They talk of destroying them with fire? Anything yet? OK, well what about all the good guys biting the bullet at the end? Bruno Mattei is known for ripoffs. Just like all Italian horror directors. This movie seems like ROTLD on a tropical island. Don't bother unless you're really bored. Pass.

[wtffilm]

Is it me, or does this movie smack of ripoff? I saw this piece of trash when i was a kid and even then it seemed like a ripoff of Return of The Living Dead.

Night of the Zombies (aka Hell of the Living Dead, Virus, etc.) is undoubtedly a rip-off of the majority of zombie oriented gore films to come before it (all the way down to stealing soundtrack cues from Italian prog-rock band Goblin).  But it was released in 1980, whereas Return of the Living Dead was released in 1985.

Kindest regards,

Kevin P.
http://www.wtf-film.com

[JD]

TooManyZombies wrote:

For one, THIS IS NOT A DAWN OF THE DEAD RIP-OFF. DAWN OF THE DEAD DID NOT TAKE PLACE ON A TROPICAL ISLAND, NOR DID IT INVOLVE COMMANDOS. Honestly, aside from the fact it has zombies there's almost no similarity, and if being a zombie movie makes this a DotD rip-off, well I guess that makes every movie where a character wears shoes a Wizard Of Oz clone.

Yes, the plot was different than Dawn (for example, in none of the Romero films it is ever clear what causes the zombies in the first place, unlike this movie, where the "culprit" -a man-made gas- is quickly established for the viewer) but it did borrow a number of other things from the Romero films: The Goblin music, the flesh-eating, the "destroy their brains in order to kill them" thing, and one sequence in the movie is even taken practically verbatim from Night of the Living Dead!!! (the scenes where the scientist explains that he was examining a cadaver with amputated limbs and it started to move.)

Goreign wrote:

Is it me, or does this movie smack of ripoff? I saw this piece of trash when i was a kid and even then it seemed like a ripoff of Return of The Living Dead. A noxious gas turns plant workers into zombies? Eh?

No, as someone else has pointed out, this movie came out several years before Return of the Living Dead. It seems some people are quick to point out the elements from previous zombie movies this film has borrowed but not point out some of the elements other zombie movies seem to have borrowed from this one. As far as I can remember (and please feel free to remind me if there is a previous example), this and Toxic Zombies (also from 1980) are the first flicks to feature chemically-induced cannibal zombies.

[Andrew]

Is it me, or does this movie smack of ripoff? I saw this piece of trash when i was a kid and even then it seemed like a ripoff of Return of The Living Dead. A noxious gas turns plant workers into zombies? Eh?

No, as someone else has pointed out, this movie came out several years before Return of the Living Dead. It seems some people are quick to point out the elements from previous zombie movies this film has borrowed but not point out some of the elements other zombie movies seem to have borrowed from this one. As far as I can remember (and please feel free to remind me if there is a previous example), this and Toxic Zombies (also from 1980) are the first flicks to feature chemically-induced cannibal zombies.

"Let Sleeping Corpses Lie" (1974) contains zombies created from experimental pest control measures.  They're not quite the same, but it an interesting older idea.  Also, and these really are not cannibals, I know that some of the older voodoo zombie movies involve poisons in the voodoo.

[Menard]

Is it me, or does this movie smack of ripoff? I saw this piece of trash when i was a kid and even then it seemed like a ripoff of Return of The Living Dead. A noxious gas turns plant workers into zombies? Eh? They talk of destroying them with fire? Anything yet? OK, well what about all the good guys biting the bullet at the end? Bruno Mattei is known for ripoffs. Just like all Italian horror directors. This movie seems like ROTLD on a tropical island. Don't bother unless you're really bored. Pass.

Quite frankly, who gives a damn if it was a ripoff of any other movie or not.

I like the Romero/Fulci type zombie movie, and this fits the mold just fine for this type of film.

If we are so damn concerned about ripoffs in horror film, or b-movies in general, then we might as well not watch any movies whatsoever as every vampire movie would then be a ripoff of Dracula, every mad scientist movie a ripoff of Frankenstein, and according to some theory out there just about every movie made has one of like 7 core plots that is just rehashed over and over again.

There is comfort in familiarity. We have our favorite foods, candy, toys, people, and we tend to gravitate that way in most things we do, including in the movies we like.

If you are looking for originality, you may want to avoid zombie movies. Include horror movies as well. Hell, you might just want to avoid movies altogether.

[LoSt187]

I saw this movie once many years ago when I was probably around the age of 7 or 8 and all I remembered were the boobs. For some reason I decided to go hunting for the movie that contained those funbags, and I'm glad I found it. But based on your comments I'm not sure if I want to watch it. Actually it can't be any worse than that movie I saw of Jesus fighting lesbian vampires in mid 90s LA. I'm gonna take a look, and thank you for reconnecting me with my pre-adolescent memories of bouncing tits.

[Tori]

That "up your ass" line is possibly the most hilariously bad line I have ever heard.

This rates in my top ten truly awful movies of all time. But I love it, in a way, because it's so mind-numbingly stupid.

[MaryInBoise]

Hot as a horse's ass?  Exactly how hot is a horse's ass? Has anyone actually done scientific experiments to find out?  Has anyone empirically discovered that "hot as a horse's ass" = "fly time" (whatever that is)?  I'm going to guess the answer is no.

[Trevor]

Vincent: "Patience is the chief virtue of those who have faith, Mahtama Gandhi, New Dehli, 1946.
London: "Up your ass, Lieutenant Mike London, s**t Creek, the year is now."