Children of the Living Dead (2001)

Pretty Good

I don't have all the words right now but this film is a work of art.

Better Late Then Never

Actress is magnificent and exudes a hypnotic screen presence in this affecting drama.

After years of disappearances around town, the local sheriff finds them all tied to a local legend about a ravenous zombie intent on waging war on humanity and forces the town's survivors to fight off his undead hordes.This here actually wasn't that bad. One of the better elements is the fact that it features a main zombie who has a distinct personality and a sense of intelligence which is a nice change of pace from most zombie films, staying in the shadows while setting out a game plan and knows when to sneak up on victims. This gives it more than a typical zombie film in his behavior, and along with the rather impressive make-up work on the zombies with lots of wounds that get bloodier and more disgusting, and with their rotting, dead look and glaring fangs create some pretty imposing features and makes for an overall effective amount of zombie mayhem. Another big factor here is the action within this one as this features a rather enjoyable amount of action within this. The fact that the film starts off with a big action scene of them trying to knock off hordes of zombies rampaging through the countryside is a big plus, leading to a lot of close-calls and big action as the odds are stacked towards them enough to make them seem like a threat. Other great sequences include the great barnyard encounter as well as the big swarm encounters through town that occur in the later half which really makes for an entertaining time. Along with some fun suspense scenes of the zombies attacking the townspeople in a series of surprise attacks as well as plenty of great bloodshed are the film's good points, while this one here doesn't have too many flaws to it. The fact that it does have some really blatant obviousness in its cheapness is something to get over. The gore and wounds are hardly realistic, especially the finale bloodbath though there are plenty of obvious examples before that and allow for some pretty big examples. Aside from the low-budget, another flaw in here is that the film has a bit of a problem with pacing here, especially in the middle section. This is due to a confusing habit of changing around years, jumping around to different years at various points along the way by seemingly injecting a new scene into the film almost every time it changes scenes. It's not clear why this is done and it's purpose is a puzzling one since it could've easily done so without changing around the years around to make this as confusing as it is. While some out there will decry the new treatment afforded to the zombies' behavior and actions, it's not enough to hold it back like the rest of the film's flaws.Rated R: Graphic Violence and Graphic Language.

When I heard that John Russo was making a sequel to Night of the Living Dead I was really interested. He wrote midnight which was made into an effect low budget horror movie. So I had high hopes for this movie. It was only later that i found out that Russo's claim to having input into Night of the living dead the plot was to put the word living into living dead. Unfortunately my high hopes were misplaced as this movie is dire. Russo also scripted Return of the living dead. This movie puts the low into low budget.The basic plot is that a zombie left over from from the original NOTLD has been living in a loft he escapes the loft and goes on the rampage turning everyone into zombies.Apart from the FX guy from Dawn of the dead there seem to be no professionals working on this movie. He just acts and does not do the effects. This is also a shame as the effects are average. This movie is dull it is not scary. I hated it and will never watch it again.

Lame-brained zombie film, with film-making duties by various participants of "Night of the Living Dead". This particular flick concerns teenagers who died in a vehicle crash over a cliff thanks to a zombie, Abbott Hayes(A Barrett Worland), who wasn't killed in a small town extermination. Hayes resurrects their corpses by biting them, and as a group they pursue live human victims as a major car dealership development is underway. The film centers of the blossoming relationship between Matthew Michaels(Damien Luvara), whose father is the head honcho behind the dealership, and Laurie Danesi(Jamie McCoy),the small town waitress. Sheriff Randolph(Marty Schiff)is in cahoots with the developers in pulling up the caskets and headstones from a cemetery burying the loved ones in a mass grave to save money. Abbott Hayes will lead his zombie troops on a raid on the diner as Michael, Laurie & Randolph hole up awaiting help from the development workers.I think many might wish to check this one out for the opening fifteen or so minutes where make-up effects legend Tom Savini goes bad ass as a survivalist town deputy who takes out zombies singlehanded. The opening of the film resembles the close of "Night of the Living Dead" as townspeople work as an organized hunting party eradicating the walking dead with guns and rifles. Once Abbott Hayes is introduced(..first looking like a corpse, and when the film moves fourteen years later, resembles a monstrous ghoul)the film sours immediately. The screenplay is uninvolving never remaining focused with the film becoming an uneven and tedious exercise where boredom sets in like gangrene rotting away the viewer's patience..well, that's what this film felt like to me, gangrene rotting away my patience. I kept hoping that something would come from this film, but when you have dialogue this putrid with a cast equally as painful, there's no hope at all. I am not sure this will even work for the most enthusiastic zombie fan. The final showdown at the end has workers, with plenty of weapons and ammunition toiling with the zombies in hand-to-hand combat! While the fighting occurs, Abbott Hayes is shown delighting as the carnage ensues. Hayes seems to be merely in the film to wickedly grin as his minions attack pea-brained human clowns. What a travesty. Actor Bill Hinzman tries to put some energy into the photography, but that shot in the arm can do little to inject life into a film where quality whithers minute to minute. This film would've done better to follow Savini throughout the film wasting zombies rather than focus on a car dealership development and the dull relations of a would-be couple.Savini and some minor moments of zombie gore lift this to 2 stars instead of 1.

I have suffered through some horrible horror movies through the years; The Alien Dead, Blood Diner, Lawnmower Man...just to name a few. I actually walked out of the theater on the Lawnmower Man, but I digress. I would have walked out of this abomination too, except I was AT home as this turd was a direct to DVD release. It got sooo bad about 45 minutes through I put my player on 4x speed just so I could skip over the mind-numbingly bad acting and dialogue. Abbot Hayes, the leader of the prancing dead. All this bastard does in the film is lurk in the shadows, prance, and grin/mug maniacally at the camera. He is a precedent setter though, the first queer zombie on film, oh wait Michael Jackson, never mind.