Ever since that Syfy film made “so bad it’s good” filmmaking cool it opened up the market to movies that wear their awfulness on their sleeves.
Enter “Zombeavers.”
The new film features a microscopic budget, special effects your kid sister could lap and gore aplenty. It also never takes itself seriously, perhaps the biggest feather in its zom-cap. Is it worth your while? Only if you’re a horror junkie willing to snack on a few funny gags and gross-out moments.
The trouble begins when a canister of toxic waste unloads near a community of peaceful beavers. How many times have we seen that trope?
It’s terrible news for six pals vacationing near the beavers’ pulpy abode. They quickly meet the new, not so improved beavers with an appetite for flesh to match their oversized choppers.
And … scene. No more, no less.
“Zombeavers” boils down the genre to its essentials: naked women, detached limbs, a high body count and a cabin in the woods.
The film’s young cast is more ingratiating than usual given the genre’s low expectations. They’re blunt about sex, friendship and leisure time, a slight upgrade over standard horror movie victims. And yes, the other, more crude meaning of the word “beaver” will be summoned during their occasionally witty banter.
The film wisely amps up the blood and comic mayhem in the last half hour, knowing full well it’s exhausted its supply of “beaver” themed puns. We finally see what happens when an undead beaver bites a human. Hint: their dental policy won’t cover their new look.
At some point the culture will grow bored of this curious sub-genre. It might take a third “Sharknado” or second “Birdemic” before than happens. Until then there’s “Zombeavers.” It may not be wacky enough, funny enough or scary enough, but it’s comfortable in its own B-movie skin.
It’s also impossible to hold a grudge against a film that wraps with a song as monumentally goofy as the one at the end of “Zombeavers.”
DID YOU KNOW: ‘Zombeavers’ director Jordan Rubin helped sell the film by creating a fake movie trailer featuring footage from several existing horror movies and a beaver documentary.
The trailer says it all, with its last line. “I mean, really?”
I wrote my own review of the film last year: http://nukemars.com/?p=2915
I admit it, I really loved the Sharknado movies. They are romping good fun, and make great use of a chain saw. Ian Zierling is surprisingly decent as the hero in the movies. I will admit though, anytime you can chomp the big three NYC, LA or San Francisco you are pretty much gold in my book. Watching the recent Godzilla smash SanFran was very satisfying. Although the bug nookie was slightly odd to say the least.
My rule of thumb for a horror movie, or just about any movie, is that the plot has to make some sense, it has to stay fairly consistent and it can’t take a sudden race into left field plot-wise. If the basics hang together for the whole movie, I am a happy camper. Oh and the movie has to have a great ending and not just fizzle out like a deflating balloon at the end. The director cannot take us along for that kind of ride and not give us a great ending.