As you might be able to tell from my blog name; zombies are what originally drew me to horror films in the first place. Ever since I watched Michael Jackson's Thriller music video as a child I was hooked on these soulless unstoppable monsters. Some things go together very well - fish and chips, salt and pepper, and indeed; Nazis and zombies. The David Gregory (Return of Krampus) directed Zombies of the Third Reich brings those last two together in a lovely blend, I am very happy to see indie zombie films such as this are still being made in present day, I never get bored of these!
Set during World War II, soldiers at a Nazi occupied bunker in France are conducting disturbing experiments with the hope of creating super soldiers. With Hitler showing specific interest in these tests, he has ordered for the testing to be brought forward, despite the calculations for the effects of this process not being properly completed. The process involves setting off a small bomb within range of some prisoners, the explosion infused with the technology to alter the DNA of anyone caught in the blast radius, changing them into a more deadly and primal human. It might have been wise to finish those calculations, as the test bomb results in the whole bunker going dark and losing contact with the outside world. The allied forces notice this, and with them having a spy situated there, and with rumours of a possible visit from Adolf Hitler himself, a crack squad of British and American soldiers, led by Charles Craftman (Zach Devereux - A Woman Scorned, and on an off-note, his IMDB page states he comes from Northampton - my home town), are tasked with infiltrating the bunker and retrieving the spy should he still live, as well as investigating what the Nazis were testing there. They discover the bomb test went quite wrong, and that now, every inhabitant of the cursed bunker are one of the living dead!
Zombies of the Third Reich did exactly what I assumed it would do. It told an exciting and unsurprising story with a cast of almost stereotypical soldiers of the time, with them battling plenty of zombies. You don't need Shakespeare here, and indeed you don't get it. The script is occasionally so corny that it nearly falls into parody. The briefing scene where Craftman receives his orders featured a character who I don't think would have felt out of place in the World War I Blackadder sitcom season, wild eyed, perfect posh accent, and crazed orders combined for a delightful, if slightly off-brand scene. This is about as comedic as the film gets, as despite being low budget, this takes itself relatively seriously. Much is made of not a lot, from the cast of protagonists who number just six, to the undead who never really appear in huge numbers, but still feel effective due to the tight and claustrophobic bunker location used, they all play their roles perfectly. Each of the characters had strong personalities that set them apart from each other, from the grizzled British soldier Matthew West (Rod Glenn - It Be an Evil Moon), to Taja Christian's mild mannered medic Charlotte Hayman, these characters may have had some generic dialogue and been almost caricatures, but they fitted the low budget zombie film very well, I would not want anything more.
It is obvious throughout about the limitations of the budget, but it never felt like the film was trying to be too ambitious. Action sequences are tightly shot, and the tight look of the bunker location leads to many opportunities to hide budget constraints, by having scenes play out in the narrow corridors and darkened rooms. I enjoyed the presentation here also, particular the faux intro and outro black and white sequences designed to look like old news and propaganda footage from the time period. The look of the zombies was neat, many of them having a kind of 'melted face' type image. There were a fair amount as well, though some appeared to be the same actors playing different ghouls. There is a mix of fast and slow undead, never really explained why, but some appear to be stronger and display more intelligence than others. Leads to some fun battle scenes with plenty of CG gunfire and blood spurts. You get the obligatory zombie feeding on the intestines of a victim scene, and some more surprising death scenes, such as someone who has their still beating heart pulled out of their chest! The only bad looking special effects come from several different explosions that are entirely CG based, but with a lower budget anyway these parts didn't stick out too much.
A barebones story is all that is needed to make an entertaining zombie movie, as long as the undead do their part also. Zombies of the Third Reich may be as generic as its title, but it was exactly what I look for in a zombie movie, it did exactly what I thought it would and was all the better for it. It is genuinely neat to know that films such as this are still getting made.
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