Ziam (2025) - Zombie Horror Film Review

Netflix has quite a good track record when it comes to Asian zombie films. I had heard a little bit of buzz about the Thailand based Ziam. This action heavy zombie horror coming from Kulp Kalijareuk (who directed and co-wrote the movie) had plenty of very cool looking undead, though the limited setting and basic story didn't do too much to make itself stand out from the horde.

In the near future, the world has fallen into anarchy due to dwindling food supplies. This has resulted in mass riots and a breakdown in law and order. Due mainly to the strong leadership of one man, Thailand has fared surprisingly well with law and order somewhat still upheld by the militarised police, who follow this leader. Singh (Mark Prin Suparat) is a former Muay Thai fighter who now works on protection details for lorries that smuggle food across the border. Meanwhile, his doctor girlfriend Rin (Nuttanicha Dungwattanawanich) works at the local hospital. Contaminated fish smuggled into the country (that happened to be the latest lorry that Singh assisted with) has the unfortunate side effect of infecting people who eat it into flesh hungry ghouls. Not knowing about zombies, the first victim is taken to the hospital where he swiftly dies, and then reanimates. It isn't long before the hospital is in chaos with violent undead taking over the place. Discovering the place is in lockdown, Singh travels there to find Rin. Not wanting the infection to spread, the police have been authorised to blow up the site, though first they have instructions to retrieve the leader and his terminally sick wife who are both situated at the top of the building. During his search for Rin, Singh discovers a young boy, together the two search for Rin, unaware about the explosive countdown occurring in the basement.

The main thing I had heard about Ziam (a play on words with Siam being another name for Thailand) was that the protagonist doesn't fight zombies with guns or other weapons, but instead uses his fists and feet! This sounded like a very risky way to fight the undead, and I can't say it ever felt particularly effective. Singh is able to fight off scores of the rotters at once for sure, but his attacks are mostly defensive, knocking the creatures to the ground rather than actually killing them half the time. It did look great on camera, there is no small number of these insane sprinting horrors. There was also a good mix of human antagonists that led to some lovely looking three way fight scenes between the trigger happy police, Singh, and the zombies. The highlight of this was Singh's fight against the police leader. A typical well choreographed fight sequence along the lines of something you would see in a movie like The Raid, but made so much better by the occasional break in fighting as both combatants have to stop to dispatch approaching undead before continuing the fight!

The zombies look fantastic and increase in number and danger as the ninety five minute movie proceeds. Without going too much into spoilers, something happens in the third act that makes these crazed ghouls even more insane and scary looking. It becomes really thrilling, especially a late scene that sees Singh trapped in a car as zombies from every conceivable angle smash their way in to him. There is lots of blood to go with these ghouls, blood spraying absolutely everywhere throughout the film.

The story was a bit too basic for its own good, extremely simple, and restricted almost entirely to the hospital. You could tell the more indie nature of the budget with outdoor scenes that never failed to feel very artificial looking. Lots of entertaining fight scenes with Prin Suparat, and the child actor was actually quite entertaining with a good amount of sass in him (such as when he giggles at a struggling zombie whose arms and legs are all encased in plaster cast). Rin was also fine, a decent enough character. The cast was pretty small with not many notable standouts. 
Despite the occasional obvious budget constraints, there were some great directing choices. One highlight was a slow sweep around the hospital, with the camera passing through walls and floors to give a great overview of the utter chaos going on. There was a slow motion blurred effect given for close ups of the undead which also worked well, due to the great zombie make-up. Some silly moments here, one part saw a character caught in the epicentre of an explosion, only to be shown moments later completely fine while all around him are in various states of destroyed limbs. The ending was also a tad cheesy, and the odd mid-credits scene that seemingly hinted at a sequel came out of nowhere.

Ziam was a neat zombie film that did something a little different with its reliance on martial arts. Plenty of very freaky looking undead, and some neat stylistic choices was let down really only by a barebones and unoriginal story that sometimes felt a little too by the numbers. Ziam is currently streaming on Netflix.

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The Rotting Zombie's Round-up of Horror News for June 2025

My blog went through a bit of a dry spell recently when it came to films sent to me for review, something that allowed me to become a bit lazier and do some shorter working weekends. That has all changed now though, a quick glance shows I still have half a dozen horrors on my radar. Onwards to the news, being written on yet another humid day here in England.

Beginning with some music news, goth pop-rock act Metamorph released a six track EP - Harlot in time for the Summer Solstice. The EP includes the title track, alongside a dance mix, an instrumental, and remixes from Spankthenun, IIOIOIOII, and Allie Frost. Metamorph's next full album; Haunted Hearts, is due for release this Autumn.

Deathgaze duo Vazum have released a new single titled 'Arise', which was inspired by the legend of the Phoenix. This is the second single from Vazum's upcoming full length album; Pretty Brutal.

Independent horror streaming platform Screamify has announced the addition of three new feature films to its library, which will be streaming exclusively on the platform. These three films are The Black-Eyed Children (a found footage about a counsellor's search for missing campers), Dreamland Awaits (Hungarian arthouse horror about a detective trying to save his family), and Lechuza; a supernatural thriller about a witch stalking a family on their camping trip. Screamify is available on major mobile and streaming devices.

Production on Zombie Plane has been wrapped up. This horror comedy that stars Vanilla Ice, Sophie Monk, Brian Austin, Ice-T and Chuck Norris playing exaggerated versions of themselves, does what it says in the title, by having a zombie outbreak during the middle of a flight.

The first trailer has been released for Dick Reno: Monster Slayer, a comedy horror adventure movie. Starring Eric Roberts, Jimmy Drain, Dawna Lee Heising, Ron Chaney and Jon Mack, this sees the titular man (Drain) battling a vampire king and his army.

CHO: A Tale of Voodoo is a new horror film said to be based on true events. In this, businessman David Cho and his family come into danger after he is cursed by a vengeful woman. This was written and produced by Frank Aguilar, with August Aguilar directing.

Finally for today (for I must do some tidying), Geno McGahee's first feature film, 2000's micro-budget Evil Awakening has resurfaced, and is now on YouTube where it can be viewed for free. The director states "It was my first film and it's chaos, but I'm very happy that it's been released into the wild again". The film is a horror about a crazed farmer who returns from the dead to get his revenge on campers and partiers.

Longlegs (2024) - Horror Film Review

I am going through a bit of a dry spell on my blog at the moment, with the screeners I am getting sent quite low in numbers. That isn't to say I am unhappy about the situation, instead I am getting to choose each weekend whether to do a reduced blog output or to select a film of my own choice to watch for review. This past weekend, I decided to give the Osgood Perkins (I Am the Pretty Thing That Lives in the House, February) written and directed Longlegs a view, starring that most iconic of cult actors; Nicolas Cage (Renfield, Mandy), even if his screen time only makes up around five minutes of the hundred or so minute thriller.

Lee Harker (Maika Monroe - Independence Day: Resurgence, It Follows) is a newly recruited FBI agent who is assigned to a long running serial killer case, working along the seasoned Agent Carter (Blair Underwood), after she demonstrates apparent psychic abilities linked to it. For over twenty years, the serial killer (the titular Longlegs, played by Cage) has been seemingly responsible for a series of family murders, in which the father butchers his family before killing himself. Despite no evidence of Longlegs having been at the homes where the murders happen, his calling card is always left behind, a message written in a strange code. After someone leaves a key to deciphering his messages at her home, Lee begins to unravel the mystery of this killer, discovering unexpected links to an event in her own childhood.

The film felt very similar in style to Silence of the Lambs, but here there is a definite supernatural element hinted at, due to the killer's ability to seemingly make people commit horrific acts without him actually being present. This odd ability meant that I struggled to follow the story at times, especially early on when a series of clues are presented to the viewer, but due to watching the film on my phone (and my eyesight not being fantastic!), I couldn't actually make out what the written information said. Much like Silence, the film is shown mainly from the perspective of the FBI agent, the socially awkward Lee. Her lack of personality is balanced against her obsession with the case she has been assigned to work on, I actually came to like the quiet and muted way she carried herself.
Any film that Cage is in I expect him to steal the attention, that is the case here despite his character barely featuring. He is often shown badly framed in camera shot, with the top half of his head cut out the shot, this just added to the mystique of the character. It is over an hour I believe until he is shown fully on camera, before this, he is always lurking in the background, or obscured. Some of the twists in the story I had already heard of, not in terms of spoilers, but more the general outline of what happens with Longlegs. He made for a very disturbing feeling character, played to sheer perfection by Cage. He makes a hell of a lot of impact for a character who is in the movie for so short a time.

Flashback sequences related to Lee spur on the story, and by the end everything makes some sort of sense, even if they are steeped in supernatural elements that made this at times feel like an extended version of an X-Files episode. The meat of the film is Lee and her investigations alongside Carter, onscreen horror is kept to a minimum, but always looked good on camera with the right amount of blood being splashed about. The story makes you think a bit, mainly admittedly due to the strangeness of what is happening, but it wasn't bad. This is the best movie I have yet seen from Perkins, the serious vibe, and the unsettling performance by Cage combine to give this a dark atmosphere all of its own.

Longlegs didn't blow me away, but I am glad I finally got around to watching it as I had wanted to ever since I saw the trailer a few years back. Cage I expected to shine, and he does, it seems he can only give amazing performances at this stage in his wild career. I thought this was an effective horror, but some of the more outlandish moments might lose some viewers. Longlegs is currently streaming on Amazon Prime Video.

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The Rotting Zombie's News Anthology for Tuesday 1st April 2025

It is April Fool's day, so what better way to celebrate than bringing together three terrifying news stories to curdle your blood.

Horror channel NYX UK has announced some of the highlights hitting the platform throughout April. April 1st sees Lou Chaney starring horrors The Unknown and The Hunchback of Notre Dame on the line-up, while Thursday 3rd is even more exciting with the Lamberto Bava double bill of the excellent Demons and Demons 2. April 8th has cult horror comedy Motel Hell, while April 22nd sees the arrival of The House on Sorority Row. Other channel premieres include vampire horror Frostbite (Thursday 10th April at 21:00), and stoner horror comedy Hansel & Gretal Get Baked.

Meanwhile, over on ARROW they have their own selection of classic films hitting their service. Exclusively on ARROW in the UK is Booger that the press release states is '...a unique blend of horror, humour and heart...' Stéphane is a darkly comedic thriller that mixes elements of the fantastic Creep with Man Bites Dog, and Mute Witness is a Hitchcockian thriller in which the only witness to a brutal crime is (as the title hints at) mute and so unable to call for help. I was also pleased to see the great sci-fi classic Xtro 3 is streaming in April, alongside slasher Hide and Go Shriek, Purgatory, found footage horror The Outwaters, comedic horror Ghost Light, Capsules and sci-fi comedy The Visitants.

Finally for today, mentioned previously, Final Days: Tales from the End Times came to digital platforms on March 28th. This award winning anthology is based around the end of the world, bringing together cosmic horror, the supernatural, and survival terror.

V/H/S/2 (2013) - Horror Anthology Film Review

I have a scheduled list of exactly when I am going to watch films sent to me for review. When the screener turns out not to work I always give myself the option to instead watch a film of my own choosing. I love anthology films, and have long wanted to work my way through the V/H/S series of horror anthologies. I can't believe it was so long ago, but back in 2022 I reviewed V/H/S, and now is the turn of its sequel - V/H/S/2.

As the title suggests, this anthology series uses the found footage genre as the concept that links the shorts together. I felt the first film showed promise, so hoped this sequel would build on the strengths.

Contained within this is a moderately sized wraparound story as well as four short films. The wraparound is titled 'Tape 49' and was written and directed by Simon Barrett (the writer of wraparound segment 'Tape 56' from the first V/H/S and writer of You're Next). Here, a private investigator named Larry (Laurence Michael Levine) has been hired to find a missing student at the request of his mother. He heads to a house with his assistant where the mother thought might be one of the locations her son could be. After breaking in, they find the place deserted, though a video they find on a laptop point to the missing young man having been there. While Larry searches the house, his assistant finds a bunch of strange VHS tapes and decides to check them out to see if they offer any clues. The tapes she watches then makes up the four short films. Much like the first movie, this wraparound segment was functional as a means for the shorts to appear, but the story wasn't particularly exciting, nor does it end up going anywhere surprising.

 After an eight minute intro, the first short begins. Titled 'Phase I Clinical Trials', this one being directed by Adam Wingard (V/H/S, You're Next), who also stars in the lead role, again, with the story written by Barrett. Wingard plays a blind young man who has recently had an operation to implant a chip in his brain that will allow him to see. Wanting to monitor the man's new implants, the company who installed the devices are recording everything that he sees. This reminded me of a Japanese film I once saw about a woman who begins to see ghosts after an eye transplant. The same thing happens here, with Larry able to see ghosts with his new 'eye'. It wasn't too enjoyable as I didn't think the very physical acting ghosts looked that scary. I thought the plot of a woman also able to see ghosts appearing (Hannah Hughes) was rushed through a bit, leading to an obvious finish.
After seventeen minutes (roughly) it is back to the wraparound before heading swiftly to second short film 'A Ride in the Park'. I was interested in this one as it is a zombie found footage film, obviously I love zombie films. Taking place in woodland, this sees a man (played by Jay Saunders) on his mountain bike accidentally getting caught up in an undead outbreak. What made this stand out a bit was the protagonist actually dies not long into the film, with nearly the rest of the short showing things from the now zombified man's perspective, as him and his new found friends gate crash a children's birthday party!. Directed by Gregory Hale, this was straight forward, but zombies are my favourite movie monster. I liked how the zombie occasionally gets reminded of the person it used to be, and the effects were decent enough, but not too memorable. 

'Safe Haven' is the third film and was by far the best one here. This Indonesian horror (directed by Gareth Huw Evans) has a film crew going to the remote headquarters of a sex cult. There becomes a triple threat of danger, what initially appears 'just' to be a deranged cult soon devolves into the undead once again appearing, and a rampaging demon. I loved this, I loved how crazy everything got. Certainly didn't expect the twists and turns within this. The story at twenty nine minutes contained a lot, I felt this would have worked equally well as a feature length film. A highlight of this was a room full of men who all commit suicide by gunshot at the exact same time, looked great on camera.
This just leaves the final film, which also happened to be the least interesting. 'Slumber Party Alien Abduction' was directed by Jason Eisener and mainly took the form of pranks a brother and sister were playing on each other, before the arrival of zombie-like aliens. My issue with this was the sheer amount of camera glitches and shaky hand camera action meant it was really hard to tell what was going on. This comes to a head with the lengthy final part which went on and on and on far longer than I felt it needed to be.

Much like the first film, V/H/S/2 showed potential but was a bit of a mixed bag. The wraparound story felt just as uninspired, but 'Safe Haven' was a definite highlight, worth the price of admission alone. With some many films in the series, I'm sure it will find its footing, maybe with the third entry? V/H/S/2 is currently available to stream on Amazon Prime Video.

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Hell House LLC Origins: The Carmichael Manor (2023) - Found Footage Horror Film Review

Once again directed and written by Stephen Cognetti, Hell House LLC Origins: The Carmichael Manor is the fourth entry in the Hell House LLC series of found footage horrors. Serving as both a prequel to the series, as well as a direct sequel to 2019's Hell House LLC III: Lake of Fire, this moves the action from the infamous Abaddon Hotel (the location of the previous three films) to a more remote location.

The format once again is set up as a mocumentary, mainly via interviews with Bradley Moynahan (Darin F. Earl II), the co-founder of an online net-sleuth website. The fake documentary revolves around Margot (Bridget Rose Perrotta) - the other co-founder of that website, who had gone on assignment with girlfriend Rebecca (Destiny Leilani Brown) and brother Chase (James Liddell) to the remote titular Carmichael Manor. This was the site of a grisly family murder back in 1989, Margot is a bit of a ghost hunter and hopes to not only find out who was responsible for the murders there, but also to see if there is any evidence of the place being haunted. Most of the mockumentary is made up of footage recovered from the manor, that has been pieced together to show exactly what led to the three people being found dead there. Having gotten permission to stay at the manor for five nights, the trio had planned to film everything in order to put together an episode for an online show. Almost right away there is definite proof caught on camera that it seems very likely the place is legitimately haunted. Chase and especially Rebecca both want to leave at the earliest opportunity, but are convinced to stay by Margot, who is excited to be capturing this evidence. As stated, with the three's bodies eventually discovered there, this turns out to be a very bad idea.

It could easily be argued that this is yet more of the same, following a familiar format to the previous films. For me, the change of location did feel like a bit of fresh air, even if it has similar beats. The story takes place after Lake of Fire, with the burning down of the Abaddon Hotel referenced, but seemed only tangentially related to that place. The manor is said to be in the next town over and at first seemed unrelated. I don't know if I missed a bit of dialogue, but the protagonists seemed aware there was some link to the hotel, eventually they find evidence of this link, but I was never sure why the characters believed there to be a link before it was discovered. Without going into too much detail, the prologue part eventually all comes together. For those who have seen the previous films and enjoyed the creepy clown mannequins that frequently moved around off-camera in those ones, this actually mainly serves as an origin story for those clown mannequins, with them also appearing here for in-film reasons. It might have been a bit convenient, but I did like how this linked to a traumatic event Margot had at a town fair as a child, where she was nearly abducted by a man dressed up like a clown.

I thought the main cast were all great in their roles, this was a far cry from the often dodgy acting of second film, Hell House LLC II: The Abaddon Hotel. I loved Brown's portrayal as Rebecca of a woman getting increasingly freaked out over the course of the four or five days (the footage being split into title carded days), and I liked how they created reasons for why the trio don't just flee at the first, second, or even third sign of trouble. The remote location gave this a more fear inducing feel, before (from my memory), the hotel was near a main road, here, with the manor in the middle of a large forest miles from anywhere, you had the feeling of the characters really being isolated from the outside world.

The horror comes in a few different forms, and I enjoyed it all. I liked how the horror is introduced early on and the forms it takes. You get people filming themselves unaware of ghosts appearing on camera, there was a cool scene featuring a female figure wearing a porcelain mask, plenty moments of those clown mannequins moving around off camera (loved when Chase says "Clowns! Why did it have to be clowns!?" to paraphrase), and a great bit when Rebecca is attempting to show her estate agent boss photos of a house over an online call. Instead of photos taken from the house, the photos show the manor, with each subsequent photo getting closer to where Rebecca is doing the video call from. There were plenty of creepy moments to be found, and they were almost always effective.

I have enjoyed most of the Hell House series, this one no exception. It might follow a familiar format, but it was wonderfully put together with a great mix of the found footage, documentary moments, and the inclusion of old footage from 1989 spliced in that the protagonists in their plight were never able to see. Lore-wise, this might seem only vaguely related to the other films, but it does come together in the movie's third act, making this a worthwhile sequel/prequel. Hell House LLC Origins: The Carmichael Manor can currently be streamed on Shudder.

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Creepshow: Season 1 (2019) - Horror TV Show Review

A few months back I decided to make a convoluted method of randomly choosing what video game to play next, due to having such an insane backlog (that is literally thousands of games long). With that method a success I thought I would apply it to films and TV show also. The first pick that came up was the Creepshow series. Released in 2019, this series is obviously based on the cult classic anthology horror films of the same name (my Creepshow 2 review here). Currently streaming on Shudder, each season is made up of six episodes, with each episode featuring two short stories.

The show is presented as if it was stories that are taken place within the titular Creepshow comic. You get little wraparound segments featuring The Creep, either in puppet or cartoon form, and during the episodes there are sections when the action freezes and transfers over to a comic book format or vice-versa. Usually these comic book sections seemed designed to save on budget by having larger set pieces be in this form before heading to a more safe and static setting for the real life footage.
I initially watched the first episode a few years back and have to say I wasn't impressed much at all. I thought the effects seemed a bit poor and the stories didn't grab me. Thankfully, heading back I was delighted with many of the episodes, with rarely a bad story to be found. The season opens up with 'Grey Matter', an adaptation of a Stephen King story. Taking place during a tremendous storm, a boy recounts events that saw his alcoholic father transform into something...wrong. My notes from the time said that the creature effects actually did look good. It was also the first of many notable names to show up this season with both Tobin Bell (the Saw franchise) and Giancarlo Esposito (Breaking Bad, Better Call Saul TV shows) featuring in small roles. The second part of this first episode was 'House of the Head' which had an interesting premise. A young girl, Evie (Cailey Fleming - The Walking Dead TV show) gets a dolls house, but the dolls appear to keep moving around on their own, with it seeming that somehow this doll family's home is being haunted by a similar sized ghost. I thought that one was both clever and creepy, though didn't end on the most satisfying note.

Episode two opens with 'Bad Wolf Down', a werewolf story set during World War II. I loved the setting and thought this was enjoyable if a little predictable. It did show how varied Creepshow could be, that was something I really took from the first season - how many different feeling episodes there were. Following this is the delightfully demented 'The Finger'. Starring DJ Qualls (Z Nation TV show) as the fourth wall breaking loner - Clark Wilson, this sees him finding a weird monstrous looking finger and deciding to take it home. Over time the finger grows into a fully formed demonic creature who begins to kill in order to please Clark. I liked this one, the puppet looked great and there was a fun vibe, especially liking Clark who narrates directly to the camera, and even steps away mid scene to have a brief talk to the audience every now and again.
The third episode has two shorts that were both good in their own right. I loved 'All Hallows Eve' that sees a group of teens going 'trick or treating', with it slowly fed out over the episode just why everyone whose homes they visit are so terrified of them. 'The Man in the Suitcase' has to be the weirdest episode of season one. This has the surreal concept of a young man accidentally bringing home the wrong suitcase from the airport. Inside he finds a strange man painfully jammed into the luggage. The young man and his friends soon discover that pain causes the trapped man to vomit up gold coins, greed makes them do bad things to get more of this. It might have been a bit obvious where this was heading but it was unique feeling.

I loved fourth episode 'The Companion' about a boy discovering a killer scarecrow, the effects for that scarecrow in particular felt very cool, I loved how his 'fingers' of hay stretched out like tendrils. While the first film in this episode was good, it could also be accused of being a little too straight forward. I personally thought that the next short - 'Lydia Layne's Better Half' was the best of the season. This sees an influential businesswoman accidentally killing her girlfriend during an argument. She puts the body on an office chair and wheels it to an office elevator, with the intention of taking it to her car and disposing of it. Unfortunately, while in the elevator there is an earthquake and the lift gets stuck between floors. This had some creepy moments to it, with it not clear for much of the run time if the corpse is actually moving of its own accord when out of eyesight, or if it is the stress of the situation getting to the protagonist.
The penultimate episode begins with a take on the classic 'monkey's paw' plot device (being a literal monkey's paw that grants wishes, but typically twisted versions of what the user had intended). As simple and predictable as it was, I thought 'Night of the Paw' was a decent short that told the story in a simple yet effective manner. 'Times is Tough in Musky Holler' was the worst episode of the season, more that it was too ambitious than it was a bad short to watch. It takes place against the backdrop of zombie apocalypse with the tables having been turned on Musky Holler's mayor and his followers (including the sheriff played by David Arquette - Scream series of films) who had gotten power hungry and ran the town as a brutal dictatorship in the name of protecting the citizens. The whole short is the lead up to and reveal of his and his followers punishment. The bad thing about this one was that a giant chunk of the story took place as a comic book sequence. The whole zombie outbreak and the mayor's abuse of power all played out this way, obviously due to the limitations of the budget for actually showing this in live action. Many of the cast were also killed offscreen, with a scoreboard used to show the viewer they are being killed. Despite the short comings, the zombie effects were cool, and this really reminded me of a short story I once read.
The final episode of season one was another mixed bag. I really enjoyed 'Skincrawlers' and was definitely the most bloody and gross short to be found here. It has a species of giant leech being used by a company as a weight loss tool, due to them having the ability to only suck fat out of bodies. I liked this one. 'By the Silver Water of Lake Champlain' had a decent idea behind it, but I don't think it was executed that well. Directed by Tom Savini and based on a story by Joe Hill, this features a teenage girl who is determined to find proof of the Loch Ness style monster that legend says resides in a large lake near her home. I liked that her determination for finding the creature came from her father being a previous victim of it, but this felt a little too small in scale, and I thought the mother character was intensely irritating.

Truth be told, I didn't expect much but found I actually really enjoyed Creepshow. I enjoyed the wraparound idea of these all being tales from a horror comic, I loved all the famous actors popping up throughout, and this had some great variation in the type of stories being told. It is also very cool reading about the scores of easter eggs hidden throughout each episode, with nods to iconic horror films and books. I look forward to one day getting around to watch future seasons.

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Outside (2024) - Zombie Horror Film Review

While I have a week off of my day job this week, most of my time will be spent going off to a friends wedding, so I fear that once again my blog will suffer for me having a social life! My best friend visited this past weekend, noticing a new zombie film added to Netflix she suggested we watch it. Outside is a Filipino zombie film written and directed by Carlo Ledesma (The Tunnel). Initially the two hours twenty two minute runtime nearly put us off even watching it, but it really doesn't feel remotely that long, which can only be a good sign.

The film begins properly with a bloody and battered car driving down lonely country roads alongside sugarcane fields. It is driven by Francis (Sid Lucero), and the other passengers include his wife Iris (Beauty Gonzalez), and their two children - young Lucas (Aiden Tyler Patdu) and teenager Josh (Marco Masa). From their dour expressions it is clear that they are not having a good time, but what isn't immediately clear is that their misery isn't entirely caused by the zombie apocalypse they seem to be in the middle of (as suggested by a bloody handprint on the car window). Francis has decided to take them to his parents remote home where he believes they will be safe. This has caused conflict as Iris has heard that the further north you head, the safer it is, and that there are survivor camps situated there, but Francis is adamant his parents house is the safest place to wait out the outbreak.
After arriving and dealing with his dead and undead parents it seems that the family might be alright, but this is the first time that Francis has returned to his family home since he was young, a place where he was badly abused by his father as a child. As well as obvious conflict with Iris, due to a large past mistake she made, he begins to exhibit severe PTSD from being back home. Over the weeks that follow his behaviour begins to get more and more erratic and disturbing to his family, the man determined to keep them together even if that means resorting to boarding up the house and making up lies about how dangerous the outside world has become.

This was a great zombie film and it felt like it did things a little differently to the norm. This is a thriller mixed with a zombie film, Francis, initially likeable, slowly ramps up his craziness, from deciding to hold Christmas in September, to not telling anyone about a map he acquired which is marked with the location of a survivor camp. It is revealed early on that Iris had an affair with Francis' brother and that Josh is a result of that affair. His paranoia that the only reason Iris wants to head north is to try and locate his brother (who had been the one to tell her it is safer there) is exacerbated by being back at his traumatic childhood home. For a film that looks so great on camera there was a surprisingly small cast with just a handful of characters, excluding the undead. The movie takes its time with long segments of zero dialogue as characters walk around, a lot of the story being the family drama. The prologue sequence that takes the form of a fuzzy home video from the unhappy couples wedding day is a strong contrast to the present where they seem to hate each other, the poor children stuck in the middle. The acting was great throughout, the dialogue a mix of Filipino and English, with subtitles that were always clear to read. A shoutout goes to the soundtrack which includes some tracks that felt very Goblin inspired, wouldn't have sounded out of place in Dawn of the Dead.

The undead really felt special here both in the way they look and the way they acted. It reminded me a lot of Pontypool in that the undead speak. In that one the zombies would repeat back phrases they heard survivors say, in this one they have the unnerving habit of constantly repeating the last thing they said before they died. This is exemplified by Francis' mum whose legless corpse crawls towards him while constantly repeating "I'm sorry". This becomes more disturbing when there are hordes of undead, all saying different phrases repeatedly. There are a lot of undead here but they are sparingly used, but their appearance always felt exciting. There was a action packed scene on a bridge, and another one in a sugarcane field, but mostly it is only a few zombies at a time who appear. They have boils on their faces, and open wounds are shown to be writhing with real maggots, which was a really neat idea. They are also both of the running and shambling variety, with them getting slower and slower the longer they are undead. There are some shocking moments of unexpected violence here, leading to some powerful scenes that had me and my friend gasping at times.

I loved Outside, it was definitely a bleak film, but it told a great story, I thought the combination of thriller and zombie film was perfectly executed, while I thought the characters were all believable. Don't let the long run time put you off, or the middling IMDB score, as this was a film well worth watching.

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