Dead Girl [DVD] [2006]

Dead Girl was never going to be an easy watch but I knew what I was letting myself in for after reading the blurb on the back of the film case. I've never been one to shy away from controversial films and have over the years seen the best and worst of what has been made and this film sits somewhere in the middle in terms of just how unsettling it actually was. Rape is always a controversial subject matter to tackle on film but combining it with horror themes of the apparent undead seemed to magnify just how horrific the assaults actually were. If the film had any sort of message contained in its narrative it would be that monsters can take any form, here the monster is clearly JT and his need to satisfy his sexual urges, he uses and abuses the girl without any consideration for her own situation, he isn't sympathetic or even curious as to why she is there or how long she has been abandoned for he simply sees her as something to screw. Rickie on the other hand is the more sympathetic of the two but even so has his own issues that make him a rather flawed character, he refuses to touch the girl and knows that JT is doing wrong and whilst he does make a half hearted attempt to free her he never commits to doing the right thing. Instead he allows JT to hold influence over him and in doing so makes him complicit.

The early parts of the film manage to build and maintain a great deal of tension as you never know quite what is going to happen next, for much of the opening sections the girl is JT and Rickie's dark secret, no one knows about her but them and JT exploits his influence over his friend. As the film progresses though more characters find out about the girl and this is where the film, for me, went a little off the rails.... The more people that find out about DeadGirl the more ridiculous the film becomes as we are expected to believe that any teenage boy with raging hormones would choose to rape rather than help the girl, whilst I didn't get the impression the film was particularly 'anti-men' it certainly could be accused of being so and for me it should have been restricted to just the two main characters and their conflicting beliefs rather than bringing in other characters and expecting them to share the secret.

It's a difficult film to admire in all honesty and although bloody in places it isn't a mainstream horror, the film makers are deliberately vague in explaining who the girl is and why she is where she is so anyone looking for clear cut answers will be disappointed. The pacing is often times slow and the narrative seems to wander off in random directions and I often got the feeling that the film was trying to be more 'art house' than horror/drama. Acting wise all of the lead characters are good, both JT and Rickie are strongly portrayed and believable, JT is by far the darker of the two and Noah Segan does play the part well. The girl played by Jenny Spain doesn't have much to do for the majority of the film, she never speaks only grunts and always appears naked, she isn't the focus of the film though even though she is the titular character its the people around her who we follow, even in her somewhat limited role Spain does remain in character throughout and does give an outstanding performance.

Whilst the mid section of the film does seem to wander and loose focus by the time it comes to the end it manages to pack quite a punch with a visually shocking conclusion. The make up effects at the end are particularly good and look very realistic and a nice twisted ending should satisfy those with a sick sense of humour. The ending is worth waiting for and although I did lose interest in the film in places I did like the ending so it made the overall commitment to the film worthwhile.

It isn't a film for the faint-hearted and many will be appalled at what takes place so hopefully my review will serve as a warning that it does deal with some very heavy issues. For me it was a curious film and whilst I wouldn't say I 'enjoyed' it I did like the ending and the characterisations. 3 stars as a rating seems fair, thanks for reading my review. Read more ›

Let's be honest. Zombie movies. Done to bloody death.

This film though... this film is perhaps the most original and memorable zombie flick since Night of the Living Dead. There's no outbreak, or any of the usual genre clichés that we're used to seeing (save for the whole "infection via bite" idea). Granted, there are clichés of a different sort: there are discernible heroes and villains, and the villains get their comeuppance at the end. There's also the usual stereotypes that we run into in any movie set in or near a high school: the alienated losers, the arrogant jocks... While the film does incorporate these familiar conventions, it does so in a way that I can honestly say that I've never seen done before. Moreover, not only does this film lead the audience down an unusual path, but it also does so in a way that is commendably daring.

So what's this film about then? Well, there's these two losers who have been friends since childhood. One day the two friends discover an apparently comatose naked woman chained up in the basement of an abandoned mental asylum. They soon discover that this woman is more than just comatose though: she's (un)dead. Still, zombie or not, the chick is still kinda hot... From here the film gets pretty dark and nasty, as one of the friends decides that he wants to keep the eponymous dead girl for his own personal -ahem!- use. The other guy takes the moral high-ground and wants nothing to do with it. Thus begins the conflict that will lie at the heart of this off-beat-black-comedy-cum-horror-cum-character-study.

All in all, I would heartily recommend this sick gem to any horror fans who're bored with the familiar zombie apocalypse stuff.

I never read the stuff on the DVD cover, so I wasn't sure what to expect. The film was certainly original. Have not seen anything remotely like it before. I found it a tad sick. The coming of age thing was perhaps an excuse for raping a zombie. A bit off my radar. However, I'm all in favour of breaking new ground.

Got this DVD, watched it once, will never watch it again!

I've seen some bad movies before, ones that are so bad they're good or even funny! But not this audacious waste of time & money.

To sum up this enter movie;

"Oh look we've found a zombie woman tied to a bed in the basement of an abandoned mental hospital. Nothing weird about that. Oh well I guess we should just have group sex with her. Nothing bad can come from that. Contraception? Nah we don't need that."

This movie is at best the quality of a bad student movie! The characters represent the sheer stupidity and weakness in some people.

Oh and one more thing. The woman on the DVD cover isn't even the same woman in the movie!
Terrible, truly terrible.

Deadgirl is a movie that came out of nowhere. When I first saw it a few months ago, I honestly didn't know what to think of it and no one seemed to know anything about it. I also had to keep reminding myself that it was American. This is the kind of thing I would expect from the Japanese, or maybe one of Europe's more unhinged filmmakers, but the United States?!. The film was very weird and quite original, definetely not the type of mainstream horror that appears regularly on the shelves. Ricky (Shiloh Fernandez) and JT (Noah Segan) are two slackers, who one day while skipping class, decide to hang out in a local abandoned insane asylum. While investigating the basement, they come across the body of a naked girl, chained down to a table. On further inspection, they realize she is alive! Ricky immediately says they should call the cops, but JT has other ideas. JT decides that they should keep her and use her as a sex slave. The problem is that the woman can't be killed and she is the living dead, there is also the problem of her infecting others as you will see in the film as the results were quite sick. First of all I really enjoyed "Deadgirl". The film is quite controversial when it comes to its dark necrophiliac subject matter but it was also a different type of film which I haven't seen before. There are some moments of gore and violence and a seriously twisted climax. The moral ambivalence of the film is actually the most disturbing thing about it. The main performances of Shiloh Fernandez and Noah Segan are very strong and my highest respect goes to Jenny Spain, who spends nearly every scene she is in naked and tormented.Fans of extreme cinema will no doubt enjoy "Deadgirl" while others should probably avoid this sick, twisted and highly amusing film.