Zombie Nation (DVD)

When I saw the direct-to-DVD movie, Zodiac Killer, I was so disgusted that I vowed that no one could ever pay me enough to watch another Ulli Lommel film. Well, guess what?

Lommel is an independent video director who's so obsessed with real-life murders, up till now that's been the claim to fame for his quickie-exploitation oeuvre: B.T.K., Green River Killer, Black Dahlia, and Zodiac Killer are just a few of these titles. I've only seen the latter, but it literally blots the sun as one of the worst-made, most odious, disgusting, tasteless and most tedious movies I have ever seen in my entire life.

But Zombie Nation is pure fantasy. There's no one real to offend, so I thought perhaps it wouldn't be that bad. Perhaps I was wrong about that. As one of the user comments on IMDb.com says, this movie is only fit for viewers like Helen Keller.

With a cheap shot-on-home-video look that makes The Blair Witch Project look like The Chronicles of Narnia, Zombie Nation starts off with the story of a totally messed up police officer who pulls women over in his unmarked car and sadistically murders them while his rookie partner waits, oblivious to it all. In one hilariously atrocious scene, the older cop carries the body of his latest victim out of an abandoned warehouse in a black body bag, tosses it into the trunk, and effortlessly convinces the younger cop that he "let her go" after some harmless "interrogation." Perhaps the part was typecast, because anyone dumb enough to be in a Lommel film would probably be dumb enough to buy that story, too.

Meanwhile, a group of wannabe filmmakers are working on a zombie movie that's supposed to be bad. And it is. The undead corpses are transformed via "movie magic" with smeary black eyeliner and… well, that's it. Reel life collides with real life when the zombies take on the form of the psychotic officer's victims and go after him with a vengeance. I guess that's supposed to be the irony of Zombie Nation. Ha, ha. I get it. Now pass the barf bag.

The only way you'll get me to watch another Ulli Lommel film is to make me choose between that or having a loaded pistol taped to my temple which is rigged to an active landmine under my foot as you douse me with itching powder. (I really mean it this time!)

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