Premutos: Lord of the Living Dead (1997)
Well, that was a piece of shit.
No seriously. That was kind of like watching that Fox News comedy pilot that tried to be like a conservative Daily Show. You remember? It would do something really unfunny and then it's defenders would say something like "Well you thought it was funny when John Stewart did it." And you were like, "No, when John Stewart does it, it's funny. That wasn't funny. You don't know what you're doing, you unfunny piece of shit!" And they go, "You're just liberally biased and can dish it out but can't take it." And you go, "No you stupid fuck. That wasn't funny. It was offensive. You don't understand comedy you stupid stupid fuck."
Or something like that. But with splatter films instead of comedy. If that makes any sense.
I guess the writer/director, Olaf Ittenbach, has a love for good splatter films, since he tried to do little homages to a variety of them, but they're just awful. And there's a lot of "comedy" in this. A lot of very unfunny "comedy" that had me wanting to gouge my eyes out. It doesn't help that the DVD had two soundtracks, one in the original German (with no subtitles), and one in horribly dubbed English. And when I say horribly dubbed, I mean what the fuck were they thinking? It sounds like four guys doing funny voices while they watched the movie. And why did the one chick have a British accent? Who knows? Why was there a very long sex scene stuck in the middle of the film? Why didn't it ever end?
And what the fuck was up with that dinner party? It lasted for nearly half the film and all took place around a coffee table. Six people crammed around a coffee table acting drunk and talking shit to each other. I couldn't wait for the zombies to show up and kill all their asses. But instead of that, the horrible step-father with the weapon collection grabs his Conan Sword (I shit thee not) and starts hacking up zombies while everyone else runs to the barn.
Later there's a tank attack, too. Because he apparently kept a tank in the garage.
Don't get me wrong though. Reading over that, one might get the impression that this would be worth watching just for the crazy shit. It's not.
This was artless and annoying.
And those cool-looking ghouls on the cover up there? Not in the film. Nowhere to be seen. In fact, when Premutos, The Lord of the Living Dead, does show up, he looks like they wrapped the actors head in bandages and then covered him in gore and fake teeth. Then they added his blue lightning eyes in post-production.
Yes, I said it. Blue lightning eyes.
The only thing positive about this piece of shit movie was the scope of the story. Premutos has been trying to manifest himself in this world for centuries and we get flashback after flashback, showing him almost getting here, but being stopped somehow. Usually with the narrative grace of a kick to the nuts (and yes, there is a kick to the nuts in this film). And, in true Easter spirit, we got to see the crucifixion of Christ for some reason. Apparently it was the power of Premutos that resurrected him? I don't know. Maybe there was actual decent dialogue and motivations in the German version. But there were NO FUCKING SUBTITLES! So we had to watch it with the WORST DUBBING EVER IN THE HISTORY OF DUBBING!!
I shit thee not.
That was one of the worst viewing experiences I've ever had. And if you go to the IMDB page linked above and see some stupid fucks comparing this to Braindead (Dead Alive), just know that these stupid fucks knows nothing. They see blood and exploding heads and get hard. They know nothing of how a story works or what is funny. This was not funny. And the gore, while excessive, wasn't very impressive either. Mentioning this piece of shit in the same breath as Braindead is blasphemy. It is more in line, budget-wise, with Bad Taste, but Bad Taste was still miles better than this crap, because Peter Jackson knew how to set up a shot, how to light a shot, and how to tell a story.
Holy Shit Saturday, indeed.
That was the danger of writing about this piece of shit. IF (and that's a big if) you just had those elements, it should at least be entertaining, right?
ReplyDeleteBut it's not. The director seems to have had no idea how to actually frame or light a shot, much less direct actors. Granted it's extremely low budget, but he could have at least tried.
So if that stuff had at least been halfway decent I might have given it a break. Instead it's accompanied by A LOT of "comedy" that just goes on and on. And it's not just the shitty shitty dubbing, the scenes just keep going well beyond when they should be stopped.
Did I mention that the dubbing is awful?
To be fair, the people on the IMDB site are mostly just arguing about which is gorier, this piece of shit or Braindead, but there are a couple who actually claim this is a better film.
Idiots.
And while there's a lot of gore, for the most part it's the same effects over and over again. Countless heads explode and many guts are torn out. And there's the classic arm or neck bite. Beyond that there's just not a lot of variety or innovation.
It's just so poorly done across the board, it is absolutely worthless. Draw yourself a flipbook of zombies attacking and you'll be more artfully entertained.