The Dead

THE DEAD (CINEMA)
Anchor Bay Entertainment UK

Release date: September 30th, 2011
Certificate (UK): 18
Running time: 100 minutes

Writers and directors: Howard J. Ford, Jonathan Ford
Composer: Imran Ahmad

Cast: Robert Freeman, Prince David Oseia

I don’t often watch zombie films, mostly because I’ve always believed that there’s only so much you can with them story-wise.

28 Days Later (2002), Dawn of the Dead (1978) and even Zombieland (2009) can only take it so far and there’s always an element of absurdity in watching an entire population eaten away by creatures who move at a slug’s pace.

That being said, The Dead is a film which breathes new life into this rather limited genre and that’s all down to the risks that Howard J. Ford and Jonathan Ford took creatively and with their lives in bringing it to fruition. Ford says:

It’s a truly terrifying film but one that is also beautifully shot and scored, making full use of its exotic location, complete with scorching deserts. Set in Western Africa, it’s the story of an American engineer, Lieutenant Brian Murphy (Robert Freeman) whose plane crashes during take off. He’s left stranded in a place that on a good day is torn apart by war, but today they’re facing a zombie epidemic.

As he tries to survive in the desolate terrain, he’s saved by Daniel (Prince David Oseia), an African soldier who’s deserted his post to try and find his family. Hearing that his son has been taken to a military camp in the north, he makes a deal with engineer. Help him get to a plane and he can have the car to journey to his son. Battling the undead, the two men find common ground and an understanding that hope is never lost.

With the zombies removed, it’s a politically charged piece of cinema, with both men at the centre of a war only through circumstance rather than any real political alliances with either side.

It’s a tense and gripping horror film. Freeman delivers a performance that’s believable; his character never dips into the bravado of the typical American military office who knows it all which is what we’re so used to seeing. Instead he has a quiet, thoughtful manner about him, couple with a growing killer instinct for survival in a place where there can be none.

As Murphy dons the head scarf and arms himself with a machete to enter the compound, The Dead makes me remember those great moments in horror and action films when the hero is one his last legs but gives it all that he has left. With the wind blowing his garments as his knives gracefully swipe at the undead it’s like a ballet of blood and I wouldn’t be surprised if there’s life here for a sequel.