The October Zombie-Thon! - Day 7: Hot Wax Zombies on Wheels
Posted by Trevor Snyder on 10.07.2007
For all those who like their zombies nice and smooth.
HOT WAX ZOMBIES ON WHEELS (2000)
Directed by: Michael Roush
Written by: Elizabeth Bergholz
Country: USA
Here's a question: how much do I really need to say about a movie called Hot Wax Zombies on Wheels? After all, I imagine a large percentage of Zombie-Thon readers will have already made up their mind whether or not they want to see it just after seeing the title. For a certain contingent of bad-movie lovers (myself included), a name like that is kind of an uncontrollable temptation. Some of you might wonder what I'm talking about, while the rest of you simply read the name of today's column and thought, "Hot Wax Zombies on Wheels? Yep, I've gotta see that."
But therein lays the power of the Zombie-Thon. You see, that's exactly what happened to me, and I barely lived to talk about it. I know there will always be those who will seek out a movie with a title so ridiculous, but if I can prevent just one person from making the same mistake I did, then I become a sort of saint, on the level of Mother Theresa – only even better.
Because, trust me, this film is nowhere near as funny or entertaining as the name would have you believe. Really, the nicest thing I can say about it is that, for me, it was a somewhat nostalgic throwback to a kind of comedy you just don't see anymore. For while it desperately wants to be a mix between the anarchy of Troma and the off-the-wall humor of the Zucker brothers, its campy tone, brain-dead jokes, and copious amounts of gratuitous female nudity (perhaps the most I've seen in a movie written by a woman) put it more in line with the type of sex-comedies that used to populate USA Network's Up All Night. Seriously, all this thing needed was periodic commercial breaks hosted by Gilbert Gottfried or Rhonda Shear, and it would have felt right at home on a double bill with such '80s skin-flick classics as Stewardess School or The Bikini Carwash Company.
I will give it this, though; the title does pretty much tell you all you need to know about the film. The "hot wax zombies" in question are controlled by an evil, leather-clad dominatrix (Yvonne Wayne), who is intent on ridding the world of pesky body hair. Slowly but surely she is accomplishing her dream, thanks to a special wax formula she has developed that not only gets rid of hair, but also turns those who use it into an army of blissful sex maniacs. What exactly is Wayne's beef with body hair, anyway? The film never bothers explaining it, which is surprising, since it seems a movie like this would have a hard time resisting some sort of cheesy flashback involving a past traumatic incident involving an overly hairy man.
No matter – whatever her reasons are, business is going well for Wayne. Eager to expand her enterprise to the major market of Beverly Hills, and thus begin her world domination (we just have to grin and accept the idea that somebody could take over the world through body-hair removal), Wayne decides to do one last test-run, setting up a waxing parlor in a coastal fishing town. Of course, it's the kind of small, insular community where something as weird and strange as a waxing salon sets off all kind of red flags, but all that's overlooked when free waxes are offered to all first-timers. Soon, the town is crawling with smooth, sex-starved crazies, and it's up to the owner of the local lingerie shop, along with her hair stylist boyfriend and hair stylist best friend (whose business has taken quite the hit since the waxing parlor came to town), to fight back and put an end to all the waxing madness.
Let me just quickly say this – that the film features a couple of male hair stylists as two of its heroes, and presents both of them as being 100% straight, is both surprising and somewhat admirable. Then again, I wonder if this was done out of concern that the more obvious gay jokes would be in poor taste. If this was the case, they really shouldn't have worried about it – gay men and women of the world have a lot more important things to concern themselves with than a lame movie like Hot Wax Zombies on Wheels.
Then again, maybe the joke is that the two male hair stylists are straight. This isn't particularly funny, but then neither is anything else in the movie, so it's a definite possibility. There's really nothing worse than a bad comedy – while a terrible action, horror, or even drama can become funny just because of its sheer ineptness, a shitty comedy is the exact opposite – there's nothing amusing about watching a film try so hard for laughs and failing so miserably.
The real problem here is that the filmmakers know they are making a bad movie, and so they just go along and try to conform to the expectations of bad-movie lovers. This is almost always a mistake – a movie made to be bad is never as entertaining as a film that doesn't realize how bad it is. If Hot Wax Zombies on Wheels had been made with the same concept but a deadly-serious attitude, it probably would have been hilarious. But as is, it's just trying too hard to be crappy.
Of course, it doesn't help matters any that the thing doesn't make a lick of sense. Now, I know, by voicing a complaint like that about a movie called Hot Wax Zombies on Wheels, I kind of become the asshole. But, sorry, this thing is a mess. No, I suppose I wasn't expecting the most intelligent or coherent of plots, but I'd at least like to feel as if there was some sort of logical chain of events moving the story along. Instead, the film jumps jarringly from scene to unrelated scene with all the subtlety of a sledgehammer. At no point does it feel like there was even an attempt made at keeping the story moving in a somewhat cohesive manner. In fact, by film's end, I had a sneaking suspicion that they were mostly just making the whole thing up as they went along, thus explaining the sometimes random sudden appearances of characters in several scenes – not to mention the idiotic anti-climax (so bad that even the characters themselves are forced to comment on it).
So no, despite the oh-so-appealing title, this one isn't really worth anyone's time. Still, if for whatever reason you find that you just must watch Hot Wax Zombies, for goodness sake, don't attempt it alone. Watch it with a group of friends and, at the very least, make a drinking game out of it. Try taking a shot anytime a goofy sound effect is added or the phrase "pesky body hair" is uttered. (Note: this author is not responsible for any brain damage or alcohol poisoning that may occur from said drinking game).
