The October Zombie-Thon! - Day 3: Deadlands: The Rising
Posted by Trevor Snyder on 10.03.2007
If it's already this bad this early on in the Zombie-Thon, we might be in for a long month.
DEADLANDS: THE RISING
Written & Directed by: Gary Ugarek
Country: USA
A few years back, some friends and I would get together every week and play a Dungeons & Dragons-esque role-playing game called "Deadlands," a sort of supernatural western epic. Deadlands: The Rising has nothing to do with it, although they were obviously worried enough that people would think it does, as the film starts off with text clarifying that it is in no way affiliated with the role-playing game.
I myself never assumed the movie was based on the game. So why did I even bring it up in the first place? Because, believe it or not, me telling you about my friends and I playing a dorky role-playing game is actually far more entertaining than anything Deadlands: The Rising has to offer.
As anyone who has ever taken a "Film Appreciation" class already knows, there are certain classic films that any aspiring filmmaker should probably watch and study before embarking on their own career. I would argue that this is true for hopeful zombie filmmakers as well, with seminal hits like Night of the Living Dead and Dawn of the Dead filling in for Citizen Kane and The Godfather.
By the same token, I would argue that some films are so bad that they must be studied, in order to prevent any filmmaker from ever making the same inept mistakes that sunk these crap-fests. Deadlands: The Rising is one such film, a movie that at every turn makes the wrong artistic decision, until by the end it no longer even resembles an actual film, but instead some sort of exercise in trying to make a completely unwatchable mess.
For instance, let's say you're making a zombie film, and you want to grab your audience's attention right off the bat? Would you decide on a lengthy pre-credits sequence in which two fat guys get in a car and simply drive around for awhile, while having an incredibly boring and tedious conversation? No, you probably wouldn't. But Deadlands writer/director Gary Ugarek would – hell, he'd even cast himself as one of the two guys, in a bold artistic choice to overlook his own lack of any acting skills.
Of course, in that regard, he fits right in with the rest of his cast, none of whom are what we like to call "serviceable actors." Then again, it wouldn't really matter if they were, since it's not like we can make out any of what they are saying anyway. Deadlands suffers from one of my biggest pet-peeves, the all-too typical indie-sound quality – which is really just a nice way of saying you can't hear shit.
But wait, I'm getting ahead of myself. I suppose it's only fair to mention the film's plot and message, since it does actually have one…kind of. Judging by the film's opening narration, it aspires to be a kind of anti-weapon message, as it concerns a nationwide zombie outbreak caused by terrorism. In recent years a number of films have tackled the merging of zombie themes with the realities of a post 9/11 world (Land of the Dead, 28 Weeks Later), and it is certainly not unreasonable to expect a movie to get great mileage out of such a potentially intriguing theme.
But apart from simply using terrorism as the initial cause of the problem, Deadlands has no real interest in exploring the idea any further. Instead, it fills out the rest of its running time with far too many scenes of people simply standing around, staring wistfully, and even more scenes of zombies just kind of wandering about, not really doing anything. All of this is set to haunting, melodic music, which I suppose signifies that it's supposed to be arty, but really it's just boring. It doesn't help any that the ambient music, which admittedly does create a somewhat spooky tone, has a tendency to drone on for too long.
Oh, and about those wandering zombies – that's just when they finally do show up on the scene, which they certainly take their sweet time doing. Zombies don't even make an onscreen appearance until about 20 minutes into the film, which probably doesn't sound too bad until you consider the film is only 63 minutes long.
Once they do show up, the zombies behave in a wildly inconsistent manner. Sometimes they run, sometimes they walk, and in at least one wildly inappropriate and therefore completely laughable moment, they even dash around in a super-fast, sped-up Benny Hill fashion. I don't know what Ugarek was thinking with this scene.
Then again, I'm kind of at a loss as to what Ugarek was thinking while making this movie, in general. Did he honestly think it was entertaining, that there would be an audience for a film that plays like some sort of hellish cross between a pretentious art-film and your parent's boring home videos?
Most likely, it's just another case of an indie filmmaker being a little too ambitious for his own good. It's obvious that Ugarek's vision for the story was an epic one, but this is certainly belittled by its suburban setting. Ugarek wants us to consider the impact the zombie outbreak is having on the entire world, but there's no getting around the fact that the entire movie is clearly being filmed in one small neighborhood. Once the military arrives to set up a rescue center, you can't help but wonder why they would bother doing so in such a small, insignificant community with a population of what appears to be about 20 people. Then again, maybe that's just the mission the Army gives to its less-important squads. After all, this is yet another indie zombie film where the entire might of the U.S. military is represented by a handful of guys in camouflage clothing.
There is at least one legitimately intriguing set-piece in Deadlands, in which a group of survivors stuck in a traffic jam on their way to the rescue station get out of their cars and argue about their predicament, before being swarmed by the living dead. Of course, not surprisingly, the sheer amateur-ness of the production means the sequence doesn't quite live up to its potential, but still, it's a fun idea in a film otherwise sorely lacking them.
It's certainly a lot better than the pitiful climax…if you can even call it that. After the story jumps ahead six months for the film's final 10 minutes (and not for any good reason, really), the movie builds to, well, I'm not even sure how to put it. It doesn't so much end as it just kinda…stops. No, let me rephrase that – it stops, kicks the viewer in the crotch, and then laughs at them for having wasted their time with this garbage. It's almost as if Ugarek simply couldn't think of a decent ending for the film, and finally just said, "hey, you know what? We don't even really need an ending. Let's just call it quits right here."
I'm sure there are those hardcore zombie fans out there who are dead-set on seeing every zombie film (obviously, since I'm clearly one of them), and there's not much I can say to dissuade them from checking out this one. Like I said earlier, I can only hope they do so as a means for learning how not to make a zombie film. Anyone else would be better off getting together with some friends and playing that Deadlands game. Or, like I said, just listening to me talk about how I used to play. Either option will be a lot more fun than sitting through this turgid failure.
