The October Zombie-Thon! - Day 12: Night of the Living Dorks
Posted by Trevor Snyder on 10.12.2007
Teutonic geeks with an appetite for flesh...and love.
NIGHT OF THE LIVING DORKS (2006)
Written & Directed by: Mathias Dinter
Country: Germany
Have you ever watched the American Pie films and thought to yourself, "man, this is some funny stuff, but what I'd really like to see is a zombie movie with the same kind of characters and sensibility?" No, of course you haven't. In fact, I would have guessed that no had ever had any kinds of thought even remotely like that. And yet, now I know this must not be true – for I have seen the German film Night of the Living Dorks, and thus realize that somebody thought this was a good idea. The kicker is, I also now realize they could have been right – this could have been a very good zombie comedy.
It's not. But it could have been.
Having already given you the title, there probably isn't much of a need to get into detail about plot specifics – I mean, are you really working hard to try to figure this one out? Oh well, here goes anyways: Philip, Konrad, and Wurst are three high school friends who are, shall we say, less-than-popular. I suppose I could just go ahead and call them dorks, as the movie's title suggests, but that's hardly the case. Alright, maybe it is with Konrad, who is straight out of the "stereotypical nerd" school. As for the other two, however, Wurst is the kind of fun-loving party guy that you would actually expect to be pretty popular (the movie never really makes it clear why he would be such an outcast – unless it's just from hanging with Konrad), while Philip – our hero – is just totally normal kid, almost to the point of blandness. Philip's only crime is not being as rich as the majority of the cool kids at school, which makes him a constant target of their barbs.
Even worse for Philip, he's fallen for the school's most popular and beautiful girl, Uschi - who just so happens to also be a complete bitch, which makes one wonder why exactly such a decent guy as Philip is even interested in her (apart from the obvious). Don't worry, though, Philip also has a lifelong loyal friend in cute goth-girl Rebecca, and if you suspect that perhaps…just perhaps…over the course of the film he'll realize that the girl for him has been right there in front of his eyes this whole time, well, you might just be onto something.
But that's later. For right now, he's got the hots for Uschi, OK? And because this is a zombie comedy, you just know his unrequited love will cause him to take part in some kind of crazy scheme that backfires. Really, he wouldn't be able to resist – it's "zombie comedy law." If you don't believe me, go check out My Boyfriend's Back, from last year's Zombie-Thon. No, really, go check it out – it's a much better high-school zom-com than this.
Errr, sorry, off topic again. Anyway, Philip enrolls his two buddies' help in his plan, and the three of them turn to Rebecca and her Satanist friends, hoping they will be able to help them conjure up a love spell. These aren't the brightest Satanists in the world, so instead our three "dorks" simply end up accidentally covered in the ashes of a Haitian zombie for their troubles. One ill-timed car accident later, and the three suddenly awaken in the local morgue.
At first, the guys feel none the worse for wear, and assume a mistake has been made. But it soon dawns on them that they are in fact zombies – and their total joy at this realization is one of the film's best moments. Now endowed with super-human strength, the ability to consume massive amounts of alcohol without getting drunk, and oodles of confidence (who knew that was a side-effect to being a zombie?), the three return to their normal lives and are soon the most popular kids in school. After taking revenge on the bullies who have made their life hell, Philip is suddenly on Uschi's radar, Wurst is scoring time with the requisite hot teacher (who seems mighty impressed with Wurst's ability to engage in underwater oral sex for so long without coming up for air), and Konrad…well, Konrad is having a little bit of a rough time with it.
Then again, you could also argue that he might be the only one who is actually accepting the natural order of things – while Philip and Wurst work at controlling their new, cannibalistic urges, Konrad simply decides to go with it, at first feeding on the evil gym coach, before attempting to embark on a full-fledged nerd rampage. It's eventually up to Philip and Wurst to stop their friend, while also trying to find a cure to their condition.
Perhaps my synopsis makes this sound like a lot of fun – if that's the case, I apologize. Don't get me wrong, Night of the Living Dorks is definitely not as unbearably bad as many of its zom-com peers. It moves along at a lively pace, is adequately filmed, and actually does have a few truly funny moments (and the scenes of the guys getting even with their former bullies serve as a nice sort of wish-fulfillment for anyone who ever hated the jocks at their school). Still, it seems to have too hard of a time deciding whether it wants to focus on its zombie or teenage-sex-comedy elements, and as a result simply ends up short-changing them both, leaving us with an uneven, awkward mash-up of a movie that continually falls short of its potential.
Writer/director Mathias Dinter is quite clearly enamored with American adolescent sex comedies (Porkys, American Pie, etc.), and I'll admit that it was a clever idea to merge that genre with the living dead. Unfortunately, I think Dinter has made a colossal miscalculation in terms of which direction to push the film. There's such a great possibility for wicked, mean-spirited humor here (which Konrad's eventual personality change only hints at), yet Dinter almost completely squanders it, in favor of the tame, "lets all party and have a great time" style of teen-comedy that is no longer either cutting-edge or particularly funny. Plus, given that the majority of the film's audience will probably be made up more of zombie fans than hardcore teen-comedy lovers, it probably wouldn't have hurt Dinter to include a little bit more gore here and there.
Maybe it could have still worked if Dinter had at least been able to push the sex and drinking bits incredibly over-the-top, but he doesn't really seem to have a grasp on that, either. The best this film manages is a predictable moment involving one of Philip's testicles falling off while he is getting busy with Uschi, which earns only a slight chuckle. Plus, I couldn't help but wonder – how could have Philip possibly decomposed to that degree in only a matter of days? And why is that the only body part that has problems? The answer, of course, is that it's the only body part that Dinter thought would be funny to see go. And yet, might I suggest it would have been funnier if Uschi had actually pulled off Philip's entire manhood during some heated foreplay. Once again, though, that would have required Dinter to get a little crazy - as he should have. It's a real shame to see a director not realize when they need to be a little more outrageous.
So then, we have both a zombie movie with little actual zombie action, and a sex-comedy that would barely shock your grandparents. What, then, does that leave us with? How about an underwhelming, if mildly-entertaining flick? Night of the Living Dorks has the right idea and the right cast (the actors all appear to be having a lot of fun); it just doesn't have that little extra something to move it from "an OK way to spend 90 minutes" over to "must-see laugh riot." From what I understand, a Hollywood remake is in the works. Mathias Dinter has tried hard to emulate the American teen-comedies he loves and, for the most part, has failed. Perhaps it will be up to the actual American version to capture what Dinter was trying to get across – assuming whoever is in charge can make up their damn minds about what kind of movie they're making.
FINAL SCORE: 2 out of 4 Bubs (Worth a casual look)
