Ah, yes, the Nazi zombie.  One of cinema’s greatest villains.  Since these nazi zombies are buried under the snow, and snow is crystallized water; do they count as Aquatic Nazi Zombies?  Jury’s still out on that one.

Enjoy this trailer though:

What’s this?  The perveyors of Gimorozo art like zombies as well as Batmen, kangaroos, and robots?  Wow, such a high-class site we have here!  Hope you’re hungry, cuz I know I sure am!

Who’s in it: Catriona MacColl, David Warbeck
What it’s about: A gate to hell, zombies, acid-related deaths (among many other gruesome fates)
Best line: “You have carte blanche, but not a blank check.”
Released: 1981

The Beyond is part two of Lucio Fulci’s “Gates of Hell” trilogy.  It is also the Best Movie Ever!  Do you like crucifixion?  It’s here.  Death by acid?  Got it–twice!  Zombies?  Check.  Acts of violence against eyeballs?  Times three, buddy-boy!  Awful overdubbing?  It’s here.  Loopy plot that makes absolutely no sense?  Got that in spades!  Basically, if there is anything worth seeing in a movie, The Beyond probably has it.  Additionally, it has a whole bunch of freaking awesome posters.

Basic plot is something about a hotel in Louisiana that is built over one of the seven gateways to hell.  Of course, there’s always some moron opening those kinds of gateways.  Evil enters the world, rubber spiders eat people’s faces, dog hand-puppets rip out people’s throats, blind people appear out of nowhere, zombies do zombiific things.  Yeah, it’s pretty evil.

This is one of those movies that you can never really explain to someone who doesn’t appreciate Italian gore movies already.  Many of the special effects are fairly unspecial.  The acting/dialogue/overdubbing varies from distracting to painful.  The plot leaves you dumbfounded.  And yet…and yet there is something compelling about this movie.

I was first introduced to director Lucio Fulci via Zombie (aka Zombi 2 aka Zombie Flesh-Eaters), which will get its own Best Movie Ever! entry someday.  I loved that movie instantly and quickly ran out to find more Fulcirific fun.  Having read much on the internets about The Beyond, I decided that it would be my next foray into the Italian horror genre.

But The Beyond left me puzzled.  I hated it.  Where Zombie has a simple plot that continuously builds until the climax, The Beyond feels like it was pieced together from several leftover ideas that become so convoluted that you can make neither heads nor tails.  Where Zombie chooses its gory set-pieces carefully and deliberately, The Beyond takes a kitchen sink approach.  Where Zombie’s gore pieces are all very convincing, The Beyond’s…not so much.  So, I wrote it off as that inevitable crappy movie that every film-maker is bound to make and went on my merry way.

Oh, but fate had so much more in store for our relationship.  I happened to watch it again some time later and, without any preconceived ideas of what The Beyond should be, I gradually fell in love with what The Beyond is.  Of course, to this day I have absolutely no idea what it is, but I love it none the less.  Watch the trailer below and tell me that doesn’t tug at your heartstrings.

During my Christmas vacation I was playing with Video on Demand, and I discovered this intriguing gem — Poultrygiest: Night of the Chicken Dead. It’s a Troma movie, so don’t expect much.

No, I haven’t watched it yet, but I found the trailer and the website. Now, I’m going to rent it.

The Toxic Avenger, The Class of Nukem High, and Surf Nazis Must Die are enjoyable movies. But like I said…don’t expect too much.

The trailer is from Youtube and NSFW, but the official website has the super NSFW trailer. You have been warned.

Poultrygiest: Night of the Chicken Dead Trailer

Please see the below documentary footage, but be forewarned that it is raw, unedited footage–this is definitely not recommended for the faint of heart.  I’m glad that the Church is finally doing something about the zombie holocaust, because God knows that our government seems quite content to just sit idly by while our fair citizens have their brains eaten by rotting undead.  Incidentally, I know (or should I say knew?) the poor young zombie at the 6:04 mark.  At least I can sleep at night knowing that she is in a better place now.  Thank you Father Fearless.

Who’s more villanous: Zombies or Nazis?  What’s a worse way to die: flesh eaten off the bone or drowning?  These are, perhaps, the two most pressing questions that man has ever pondered.  No longer must we choose, for now, we get all of the above in one undead package!  It’s the ultimate in cinematic horror! 

Unfortunatley, the Aquatic Nazi Zombie Movie is an oft-neglected sub-genre of Zombie filmdom.  We feel that this is a gross oversight in the world that we intend to rectify.  As such, Gimorozo has viewed and reviewed every ANZM known to man.  Read on for enlightenment!

The genre got kicked off with a bang in 1977 with Shock Waves.  It has John Carradine as some grizzly sea captain somethinornother and Peter Cushing as a (gasp!) bad guy.  Freakin’ awesome movie.  The Aquatic Nazi Zombies (ANZs) were created by Cushing to be some sort of awesome ubermench army that could survive underwater (cuz you never know when that might come in handy).  The war (that would be World War II for those of you who didn’t do so well in history class) is long over, and Peter Cushing is living on some island with his creations when some meddling kids stop by and the killing starts.

This movie has some genuinely creepy moments.  There’s no gore, really and most of the violence is off-screen.  This is the gentleman’s ANZM.  8/10.

Ah, but things would take a quick nose-dive in the land of ANZMs…

1980 is the next time that some intrepid filmakers decide to bring man’s greatest fear back to the silver screen.  Zombie Lake is the touching story of a lake infested with Zombies…and lots and lots of naked women. 

This movie is awful.  The acting is awful, the dubbing is awful, the special effects are mind-numbingly awful.  And none of this is in a so-bad-it’s-good sort of way.  Just a so-bad-I-think-I-ruptured-my-spleen-just-from-watching-this sort of way.

However, this movie can be used to illustrate one of the most basic laws of b-movies: if you make a movie that you know is crap, then you must fill it with nudity.  The converse of this law is: if a movie has copious amounts of wanton nudity, then the filmmakers themselves already know that the movie is crap.  This movie is so sure of its soul-sucking craptasticness that it has full frontal nudity BEFORE the opening title.  Wow.  So, if you haven’t gotten the message yet: THIS MOVIE SUCKS.  0/10.

Oh yeah, there’s also some sub-plot about one of the Aquatic Nazi Zombies recognizing his daughter as one of the villagers so he becomes noble or something.  Ugh.

From there, the genre could only go up, right?  …right?  Surprisingly enough: wrong.  One year later, Jess “the king of Eurosleaze” Franco unleashed Oasis of the Zombies on an unsuspecting world.  The zombies in Oasis are not quite as laughably craptacular as those in Lake, but that’s about the only good point this movie gets.  It is slooooow and boring.  In fact, I have never watched this movie to the end (and I own it…don’t ask).  I don’t know how it ends and, frankly, I don’t care.  All I can remember is that it takes place in the desert of Africa, there’s some plot about Nazi gold and there are ANZs.  Yet another 0/10. 

Ok, so maybe there’s a reason this sub-genre isn’t more popular…

There are two kinds of movies in this world: Zombie movies and movies that just aren’t worth watching.

Make friends with slow, lazy people (that is to say slower and lazier than your own geek butt) and hang out with them often.  You never know when the zombie holocaust will begin, but it’s best if you’re around people who can’t run as fast as you.  This will keep the zombies occupied.  Also, these unathletic friends will have a harder time catching and eating you once they’re turned into unathletic zombies.

Lie down with zombies, get up without brains.