ZOMBIE HIGH (1987)
In this one Andrea (played by Virginia Madsen) goes to a boarding school that just recently started allowing girls. The idea was to avoid being around her boyfriend so that she could be better at school, impress her teachers, and be worthy of her scholarship. It doesn’t take long before her boyfriend (who is really unlikable) starts coming around saying the school is pretty jacked out and there is something weird going on. It takes her over half the movie to come to the same conclusion. Most of the students start coming across as mindless drones that just go with the system at the school automatically (just like today's Universities). Soon even her friends are impacted by something sinister. This includes a dude that she is hanging out with named Emerson (played by now-director Paul Feig, whose best movie by far was GHOSTBUSTERS 2016). What is the faculty up to? Why aren’t parents all across America using the same techniques? Just kidding.
So overall this movie is extremely interesting. I get that it’s a student film and has moments of quirkiness causing some to call it a “comedy” but it’s not really a comedy and in the end result it’s more of a drama horror flick that is pretty gore-less. I guess if you view this movie as a comedy you might be more entertained by it, but the performances are not horrible by any means. Virginia Madsen holds her own in her role, (even though she was about 8 years too old to be in high school when this was filmed. I am pretty sure the first movie I ever saw her in was HIGHLANDER II: THE QUICKENING). Sherilyn Fenn who plays Andrea’s roommate Suzi is also pretty good in this. She, like Madsen, is still acting to this day. There are also several other roles that are more than fine in this thing.
It should be pointed out that in ZOMBIE HIGH we don’t have zombies really. We have mind-controlled students and a rather weird way of accomplishing that. Then we have people who use the students to access eternal life, but they aren’t really vampires? It’s all very different from the usual stuff. We also oddly don’t have a high school at all or high school students, so maybe how this movie got its name in the first place is where the comedy comes from?
I liked the quirkiness of this thing and we at least care enough about Andrea to want to see her survive. Even though it’s a slow-burn sort of movie, it’s actually enough story-wise for me to check out again, having said that, the most striking thing about this movie is likely the very end. I won’t say what happens, but the final song you hear playing is almost worth watching this movie all by itself.
Yes, ZOMBIE HIGH has all kinds of issues, but it’s intriguing, and for that, I am going to give it a 4 out of 7. If you have seen everything else, maybe give this one a watch.
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