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| Images courtesy of Saturn's Core Audio & Video |
When we hear the words “shot on video” in correlation with
the zombie apocalypse subgenre, we tend to think of cheap homegrown gore
effects, amateurish acting and otherwise do-it-yourself no-budget production
values aimed at a demographic drunk on beer, high on weed and eager for some
light yuks amid slices of pizza.
What we
don’t usually get if ever are examples of SOV zombie movies that are deeply
disturbing, transgressive, even sexually explicit pornographic shockers
designed to upset and/or appall the viewer while funneling in loftier concepts
too smart for this sort of thing. Well
in 1994, New York based writer-director Scooter McCrae armed with his Betacam SP
video camera aided by cameraman Matthew M. Howe and a few willing actors
proceeded with his directorial debut to offer the latter example which went on
to become one of the most notorious video nasties of 1995 and the history of
the BBFC.
After the Angel of Death sires a mortal woman, seen in a vaguely
erotic surreal opening montage, the dead and dying become immortal and coexist
on Earth with the living, growing ever more sullen and ill tempered over their
newfound predicament. Zeroing in seventeen
months later on gunslinging survivor Susan (Stark Raven) who navigates the barren
landscape of the undead simply trying to return home to her boyfriend, the film
becomes an episodic odyssey of encounters including a mercurial pious Preacher
Man played by Robert Wells, carjackers and an undead religious cult devoted to
the Preacher Man. Running afoul of a
young woman in an apartment later raided by bandits, Susan’s journey leads her
(and unassuming audiences) where she least expects it as more than a few atrocities
and character transformations unveil themselves.
Winning the Best Independent Film award at the 1995
Fantafestival and eventual target of censorial powers, Shatter Dead ignited
a minor firestorm of controversy in Britain where it was seized by customs and
Prime Minister John Mayor declared it never should’ve been made. With cuts imposed on its most infamous scene
involving a handgun being used as a sexual substitute, apparently performed for
real by actress Stark Raven of her own volition, the film notably includes a
scene mid-movie where a pregnant woman’s baby is blown out of her abdomen with
a shotgun and she then nurses said bloody still crying infant. Tonally speaking, these abominations land
heavy and hard as the film’s grim and downbeat outlook on the world of the
living and undead coexisting syphons out any and all senses of hope or
humor. No funning around on this
hardcore quasi-companion piece to Buddy Giovinazzo’s equally upsetting do-it-yourself
shocker Combat Shock.
Inspired to make his own low-budget exploitation film after
director McCrae and cinematographer Howe digested many examples of the
subgenre, the film emerged out of a camera test invoking what would become the
director’s narrative style. Visually
speaking for all of the awfulness contained therein Shatter Dead is a
handsomely composed VHS effort. Aided by
a subtly mournful electronic score co-written by Geek Messiah and Steven Rajkumar,
even as it plainly offers up fleshy titillation the music makes sure you feel
completely bad about it.
The amateur
cast led by Stark Raven is mostly okay though over time the interest in Raven
lies less with her performance than the extreme lengths she’s willing to go
physically for her art. Robert Wells
leaves a strong impression as the mouthy raving Preacher Man with ulterior
motives on his own while a chance encounter with a young woman named Mary (Flora
Fauna) offers a counterpoint to Stark Raven’s largely stoic performance.
From its grimy aesthetic to its vulgar piercing through our
barriers, Shatter Dead remains to this day as cold, cruel and oddly
dirty now as it was when it first appeared on VHS in 1994. One of the most thoroughly original and
unapologetically foul zombie horror movies ever made, one which puts a unique
spin on the concept while ushering in ideas too dire for the mainstream
circuit, Shatter Dead despite its apparent awfulness does offer a vision
of the zombie apocalypse never dreamt of before even in our collective worst
nightmares.
George A. Romero’s Night
of the Living Dead if it were videotaped in color with a porno cast, Shatter
Dead is difficult to recommend to most people let alone zombie horror
fans. What we get here aren’t Dawn of
the Dead’s blood and guts torn from stomachs amid pie fights and carnival
music but a somber, at times extremely graphic wallow in depravity in conjunction
with the outbreak. Not for the faint
hearted but for those willing to endure a few vulgarities mixed in with the
mayhem, Shatter Dead will provide you with a zombie film you’ve never ever
expected to see.
--Andrew Kotwicki
