Angela is shot at point blank by her boyfriend Josh, and lives in a world where the living and the dead co-exist. People continuously find ways to cope and look for answers. Angela finds Zombie Anonymous meetings, Look Alive face creams, and meat diners which help the mortally challenged find their way in this bizarre society. (Synopsis on back of DVD Case)
Zombies Anonymous was a film originally released in 2006 titled Last Rites of the Dead by Writer/Director Marc Fratto. For its 2008 release it was changed to Zombies Anonymous. As I looked, and thought about both of these titles, I had come to realize that they have entirely different tones to them. Last Rites of the Dead has a darker, and more of a traditions low budget Zombie film feel to it, and Zombies Anonymous has a lighter, more fun and nontraditional Zombie film feel to it. After Watching the movie I can see to a certain degree how both of these titles fit, but in the end Zombies Anonymous is a better title for this film.
When I first picked up Zombies Anonymous, I thought It was going to be an entirely different film that what it ended up turning out to be. As you can see from the synopsis posted above, it gives off a coming of age vibe with a zombie skin pasted on top. At least that’s the impression I got. The movie even started that way, but it took a drastic turn to what I like to call “Amateur-Low-Budget-Zombie-FilmItis”. What the director did was take a concept that I personally thought could have been great, even genius for the genre, and turned it into any old amateur re-invent the zombies type film. If the director fleshed out the story better, instead of putting together half a story and rushed to the end, he really could have had a classic film here, maybe even something close to as good as Fido. But I guess we’ll never know.
The actual technical work on the film went both ways depending on the department. I enjoyed the makeup and special effects, for the most part they were done well. There were a couple special FX that could have been better, but for the type of film it is, I would be nit-picking to pointing out exactly. The actual cinematography was mediocre. A lot of the problems I has with the cinematography was that at points the camera wasn’t white balanced, so in one sequence you’d see people with different colored lights on them in the same conversation. It really took me out of the film. You can tell it wasn’t done on purpose either. The final technical issue I had with the film was some of the audio, again in certain sequences the audio goes from sounding perfectly fine, to sounding like I’m listening to a play someone recorded with there home tape recorder.
Overall this film could have been better but it did have some entertainment value. I have to give Zombies Anonymous a 4.5 out of 10.
