As Outpost Season Two nears its explosive season finale, all of us at Finnean Nilsen Projects have been working overtime to ensure the season is unveiled flawlessly. Couple that with interviews for Terror4Fun, DrunkenZombie, Historical Tapestry and Historical Fiction Obsessed (some being released in the near future - we'll update links as they arrive) and we've been working our gifted little fingers to the bone trying to keep the world in blissful zombie awesomeness.
But every once in a while you have to neglect to tell your friends and family that you have a night off, put the kids to bed early, pour yourself a ridiculously generous adult beverage, and catch a flick. Which leads me to:
But every once in a while you have to neglect to tell your friends and family that you have a night off, put the kids to bed early, pour yourself a ridiculously generous adult beverage, and catch a flick. Which leads me to:
Let's be realistic, here. With a name like this there were only ever two possibilities:
1. It was going to suck more balls than a pitching machine, or:
2. It was going to renew my faith in humanity, specifically its ability to make a halfway decent movie (as Hollywood is currently incapable of doing).
First of all (and this has almost no bearing on the plot of the film) I'm pretty sure Michelle Ryan is my soul mate. When she came on the screen I had to run and get a fire extinguisher to ensure my TV didn't melt. In HD she was almost too much, and I thought my eyes might start bleeding. I'm sorry, Billie Piper, but you are no longer the sole temptation for me to rescind my American citizenship and return to the Old Country. Michelle, if you're reading this, call me. No, scratch that: Marry me. I'm a good cook, I'm (mostly) monogamous and I even tied my own shoes last week (my mother was very proud).
As far as the movie goes (just look at her! She's like an angel, dressed in black leather, hanging off of a trolley car, shooting zombies...) its nearly non-stop profanity, extreme violence and gore, and almost unintelligible dialogue has moved this into one of my all-time favorite British films. But the most important thing I look for in any zombie movie is, does it do anything unique?
That's where Cockneys VS Zombies actually, amazingly and shockingly for the title and premise, succeeds. There's two or three really original ideas, many of them almost treated as throwaway scenes but they make the movie. Alan Ford plays himself in yet another role, and once again he's perfect for the part. Harry Treadaway and Rasmus Hardiker have good chemistry as the brother team trying to keep everyone alive and in the money, Ashley Thomas provides probably the best scene in the entire movie, Georgia King is the cutest thing in her flowered blouse you'll ever see tied to a pole, and if you don't think you could ever be turned on by an 89 year old woman, wait til you see Honor Blackman sporting an AK and mowing down the undead.
All in all, this is a movie I'll be watching again. And did I mention Michelle Ryan wearing leather (seriously, I'm on my knees right now singing Marry Me from Train...)?
