Well, I just got back from the sparsely-attended screening of the low-budget indie zombie flick "
Dead in the Water," and I have to say: I had a good time, but I'm not sure why. I know cheesy B-movie horror is kind of an art, as displayed by classics like the "
Evil Dead" trilogy, but "
Dead in the Water" treads a fine line between crappy horror at its schlocky, cliched best and convoluted storytelling at its absolute worst. At times it teeters dangerously into "
Mystery Science Theater 3,000" territory.
As with "
Evil Dead," "
Dead in the Water" is a story about a group of kids headed up to a picturesque cabin in the woods for a weekend of boyfriend-girlfriend canoodling and general good times. The girls, Jennica (seriously, what kind of name is that?) and Tiffany are sisters whose parents bought the cabin and are supposed to meet the kids there. Of course, nothing goes according to plan, and when it's discovered that there's an army of undead living in the not-so-serene lake, Mom and Dad's grisly fate comes as no surprise. Now it's up to the girls and their boyfriends to get the hell out of "Bumblefuck, Wisconsin" as one character so eloquently puts it, and back to civilization without anyone turning into zombie fodder or, God forbid, bruising relationships, egos and feelings along the way. Riiiggghhht.
Unlike that ultimate Cabin In The Woods movie, "
Dead in the Water" suffers from some serious issues other than a kite-string budget (I know, it's a weird metaphor, but it was the only thing I could think of that was smaller than shoestring. Throw me a bone, here). Bad writing is the major cause of the issues here. There's a complicated and poorly-explained backstory told in ways that don't quite mesh with the characters or the rest of the plot, and director Marc Buhmann might have done well to cut some of the stuff out altogether.
However, the script does have its moments, and Mike Parrish, playing Joseph in the film, does his darndest to assume Bruce Campbell's throne as a B-movie badass. But this is no "
Evil Dead," and try as the filmmakers might, it doesn't even really come close. The difference is creativity. When Sam Raimi made "
Evil Dead," it was something that had never been done on that scale before. The way he did the effects in that film were ingenious. All that stop-motion stuff, the tons and tons of karo syrup, the vaseline-and-duct-tape coated camera track that provided those brilliant, lightning-speed shots, that's what made "
Evil Dead" what it is. While it's admirable that Buhmann and crew gave it a shot, the result is a movie that's worth watching for pure cheese value. "
Dead in the Water" is definitely entertaining, but in what way still remains to be seen and (I think) greatly depends on the person watching it.