The October Zombie-Thon! - Day 10: FleshEater
Posted by Trevor Snyder on 10.10.2007
A Night of the Living Dead alumnus tries to out-do Romero...how do you think that one goes?
FleshEater: Revenge of the Living Dead (1988)
Directed by: S. William Hinzman
Written by: S. William Hinzman & Bill Randolph
Country: USA
I've met Bill Hinzman, and so I can say, with 100% certainty, that he is a very nice man. I can not, however, defend either his taste or good sense. Take his interview on the FleshEater DVD's "making-of," where he insinuates that George Romero's post Night of the Living Dead success was more the result of a luck than it was any sort of legitimate talent.
I know, I know…for any die-hard zombie fan, this accusation is fighting words. But wait, Hinzman's not just out there talking trash about someone he doesn't know. In fact, Hinzman is an old friend and filmmaking partner of Romero – which, depending on your outlook, makes his statement either somewhat defensible, or even more ridiculous (take a wild guess where I fall on that one).
Now that I've mentioned the Romero-Hinzman connection, you might be thinking, "yeah, that name sounds kind of familiar." Well, actually, unless you're a real hardcore zombie follower, I somehow doubt that, so let me just give you the heads-up: Hinzman is famous (somewhat) for playing the first zombie in Night of the Living Dead. That's right, the one who attacks Barbara in the cemetery and then chases her to the farmhouse after Johnny's death.
Obviously, this earns Hinzman a special place in the hearts of horror fans – too bad he seems intent on abusing that privilege. At some point, Hinzman apparently became convinced that hisNOTLD character was a horror icon that fans desperately wanted to see more of – an assumption I'd generously call an "error in judgment." Sure, Night's opening scene is one of the most memorable in horror history, but I don't think anyone watched it and hoped for further cinematic adventures of "that one zombie."
And yet here we are. FleshEater, co-written by, directed by, and starring Hinzman, comes to us from back in the glorious year of 1988, a time when – judging by this film – everyone wore either plaid or jean jackets. The story, as it were, concerns a group of annoying young people who decide to spend the night drinking in a forest on Halloween night. Unfortunately for them (and the audience), a nearby woodsman stumbles upon a strange grave containing…should I spoil it? Oh, alright – it's Hinzman, errr, excuse me, "the FleshEater," a suit-wearing zombie who looks awfully familiar. Hinzman makes quick work of the woodsman, who predictably returns to life, and the two zombies turn their sights to the partying kids in the woods.
And then…actually, you know what? I might as well stop right there. I could summarize the plot a little more, but doing so would actually require more time and effort than Hinzman and co-writer Bill Randolph seemed to put into writing it. Suffice to say, the rest of the movie pretty much just consists of scene after scene of new characters being introduced, talking for a awhile, and then suddenly being attacked and devoured by zombies.
On paper, FleshEater sounds like something that should be right up my alley. It's corny, the gore effects are plentiful and decent (you know, in a 1988 kind of way), and it's full of 100% gratuitous nudity (a character is introduced with a lengthy full-frontal nudity shower scene – for no good reason).
And yet, hanging over the entire production is the feeling that Hinzman should have known better. I guess, if viewed with some friends during a rowdy night of drinking, FleshEater could be fun – in a cheesy kind of way, of course. But the film's Romero association – as remote as it is – gives it a sort of pedigree that it completely fails to live up to. OK, maybe Hinzman doesn't think Romero is the cinematic genius that most horror fans do, but you'd still think he would have picked up something from the guy during the time he worked with him.
Instead, FleshEater shows that Hinzman has no idea what made NOTLD – and most other successful zombie films – so effective in the first place: the human characters. Romero knew it wasn't about the zombies, it was about those survivors in the house. We got to know and care for them; they were the stars of the show. FleshEater, on the other hand, offers no likable characters, nor does it even bother letting us really get to know anyone. Most of the partying kids, who we assume will be the movie's main characters, are dead before the halfway point, and the two that remain do little more than run around and futilely try to warn others. As for the rest of the living characters, they consist of nothing more than a constant wave of zombie-fodder, introduced in brief vignettes and then promptly eliminated. Believe it or not, even a zombie fan like myself found the pattern tiresome.
I want to have a hero to root for, or a character to relate to. FleshEater is all about the zombies, as Hinzman clearly believes the audience wants to see nothing more than scene after scene of zombies just wandering about and killing people. More specifically, he thinks people really want to watch his zombie – this is a vanity project if ever there was one. As such, Hinzman's "FleshEater" is the only ghoul of the bunch with near-superhuman powers (he has the ability to throw people around like ragdolls, and punch right through stomachs as if they were tissue paper). Plus, come to think of it, most of that aforementioned gratuitous nudity comes from Hinzman pulling the shirts off of his female victims – which perhaps suggests a less-noble reason for Hinzman to make the film.
Now, let us pause for a moment here and wonder this: judging by its title – and the fact that Hinzman is obviously supposed to be playing the same zombie he did in NOTLD – it's clear that FleshEater is intended to serve as a sort of pseudo-sequel to Romero's film. Given that, isn't it a little strange that nobody – not even the officials or the media – seems to know what the hell is going once all the mayhem starts? As you might recall, the events of that night were very clearly shown to be national, probably even global news (as they surely would be). So how come none of these people remember it, or have the slightest idea what a zombie is? I have to imagine that if the dead actually had returned to life and attacked the living back in '68, we probably would have studied it in history class. And, hell, for that matter – how exactly did Hinzman's zombie end up buried in the woods – in fairly good condition – after we saw him burned to a crisp in Night's final moments?
Defenders of the movie will probably counter that FleshEater is not intended as a sequel to NOTLD; and, in fact, there's a brief snippet of dialogue thrown in that suggests this as well, offering a different possible origin for the zombies. Well, that's all well and good, I suppose…but then what exactly are they getting "revenge" for, as the title suggests?
I know asking questions like these is a waste of time, as it assumes that Hinzman and Randolph spent more than a few minutes thinking about the logistics of their screenplay ahead of time. Having seen the final product, this is an assumption I just cannot make. But, then, I guess my point is, maybe it wouldn't have hurt them to have actually considered these things before production, so as to avoid any scenes which could potentially just annoy the target audience they were going for.
For instance, let us consider one of the movie's "shocking" final twists, which is a complete and total rip-off of NOTLD's surprise ending (without giving too much away, let's just say the zombie-hunting mobs in both films seem to have a little too itchy of a trigger-finger). Now, I could question why Hinzman would bother stealing NOTLD's ending, if he's so convinced that it really wasn't all that special anyway. But my real issue is that Hinzman must have known that the majority of the audience for his film would be curious NOTLD fans. So did he really expect them to be surprised by this twist? It's set-up the exact same way – didn't he realize we'd see it coming from a mile away? Wouldn't it have been better, and more creative, to instead set-up the expected scene, and then not go through with it, to subvert our expectations and give us a happy ending? That would be a real twist, and would at least make it appear that Hinzman gave a crap.
I don't deny Hinzman his place in horror history, nor do I refute his desire to still cash in on it from time to time. It's just too bad he chose to do so in such a cheap, lazy, and obvious way. Incredibly enough, FleshEater would not even mark the final time he would again trot this character out – he reprised the role once again for the new scenes in John Russo's woefully misguided Night of the Living Dead: 30th Anniversary Edition. This time, his scenes were meant to perfectly match the original film, since these new segments were actually edited into the movie. Given that 30 years had passed, you can imagine how well they pulled that off ("hey, is it just me, or did that zombie just age 30 years in 2 minutes?").
Last time I saw Hinzman, it was at a recent horror convention, where he was also made up in his "FleshEater" costume and make-up. I'm not gonna lie – it was a somewhat sad and pathetic sight, as if your confused grandpa came to the dinner table in his old WWII uniform. And so, in a way, I suppose I even somewhat feel bad for Hinzman – he watched as Romero went on to become one of horror's living legends, and he, well, he made FleshEater. I pity him.
