Mulberry Street (2006)

[Joe the Destroyer]

Despite what many have said about Horrorfest, I still pick up their DVD's just to see if they're really "to die for."  So far, I'd say it's about a 50% shot that the movie will suck.  About half of what I saw from 2006's entourage I kept, and the other movies I pitched to the blackest hole of buy back hell known as Hastings.  Okay, maybe not the blackest, but one that would give me the most for my movies. 

Some people from work talked up Mulberry Street as being not bad, or at least as being "weird."  I'm into that.  I picked it up a few days ago along with a bunch of other DVD's to see if this really is better than most of the others.

The film uses the new age grainy flash-back-to-70's-horror feel.  The one difference here is that this film actually did it right.  Its portrayal of not only very human characters, but that realistic and gritty feel of the slums of Manhattan gave the film the proper amount of character development and embodiment without even having to tell a back story on a single person.  In this way, it made you really want the characters to get out of what transpired. 

And what transpired?  Well, the film takes an alternate route on the zombie outbreak storyline, a bit like 28 Days Later (has the same kind of feel as that movie as well, more in a sense of paying homage than ripping off), only instead of people "infected with rage" we have a disease of a different kind.  People are being bitten by rats, coming down with flu-like symptoms, and becoming something like a rat/zombie thing.  It sounds schlocky, but the way the film plays it out actually makes the idea work.  I know a lot of people find this plot device a bit ludicrous, but really how is it anymore ridiculous than people returning from the dead and munching on other people, with the only thing stopping them is destruction of the brain?  As more people are bitten, the film plays out a kind of subtle paranoia through news reports and radio broadcasts.  After a while, a legion of these rat zombies build up and begin munching on other people.   

The film has an ample amount of gore, which is to say not too much, but workable.  It didn't seem that they wanted to place an emphasis on the gore, which is just as well. 

The film also seems to pay homage to older horror flicks like Nightmare City, CHUD, and Hell of the Living Dead, even The Crazies to a certain aspect. 

All in all, the film is worth watching, but don't expect it to be a full blown purist zombie film.  It has many of the same elements, but the creatures in the movie are quite a bit different.