Review by Peter Syslo
DAY OF THE DEAD 2: CONTAGIUM (2005) is kind of a difficult film to categorize. In a sense, I suppose that it is considered to be a prequel of the original NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD and DAY OF THE DEAD. On the other hand, it could be considered as a sequel to those films. Either way you look at it, the film doesn't have too much in common with the original films... that is, except for the walking dead. Actually, the walking dead are somewhat different from Romero's vision (the “zombies” run, they can talk in full sentences, and some are more mutated and violent than others) and the traditional concept of zombies. To put things into perspective, I think that the viewer has to take this as a stand alone zombie film, and try not to link it with the Romero franchise because, invariably, I believe that a Romero fan will be disappointed. I don't think that this film was all that terrible, and it does have some interesting qualities, but it took awhile to “get going” and the zombies are just not what one would expect.
DOTD2 is directed by Ana Clavell and James Glenn Dudelson and it is written by Ryan Carrassi and Ana Clavell. The film stars Laurie Baranyay, Simon Burzinsky, Samantha Clarke, Mike Dalager.
The picture is about a type of virus that spirals out of control and infects a whole military hospital, in 1968 Pennsylvania. The virus turns its victims into flesh-eating zombies and the only cure for this problem is for the military to give head shots to everyone involved. However, one person does escape with a vial of the virus and it gets lost in a nearby field. Years later, a group of patients at a psychiatric hospital find that vial (which is in a sealed thermos) while they are on an outing. The doctor and the patients are excited about opening the “treasure”, but when one patient accidentally drops it, the infectious results rain doom upon everyone and things spiral out-of-control once again.
I liked some parts of this film, such as: the virus “explanation”; the steady build to the chaotic end; and the gradual degradation of the infected people. In the sense that this film is a prequel to the original NOTLD, I could see how the initial release of the virus would be relevant and it was actually a nice historical component. The zombie concept didn't exactly “jibe” with the zombie concept in the first three Romero films, but it was a decent explanation for things. Also, I felt that the film did a pretty nice job of building suspense. I liked the fact that you knew that, every passing day, the infection would get worse and more out-of-control. The way that it was presented was interesting because they would end a scene and start the next one with a countdown, “four days ago”,”three days ago”, etc. - leading to the present day when virus control is lost. Going hand-in-hand with that was the curiosity where you just can't help wondering how the infected are going to look “this day”. It was that same morbid curiosity that worked well with THE FLY remake and it helped to move the story along.
The downside of the film was, unfortunately, the zombies. I felt that the story was well-written, the characters where interesting, and the setting was great, but the main stars – the zombies – fell short of the ideal. First of all, they ran and sometimes that works and sometimes it doesn't work in zombie films. Second, the zombies spoke and I felt that this was the main negative quality of the film. Basically, the speaking ability of the undead took away most of the “identity” of the zombie. For me, a zombie is at its best when it is lurching along and groaning. Third, the virus seemed to be like a RESIDENT EVIL type of infection where some would be genetically mutated by it and some would look fairly human. I never quite liked that about the RE films because it seemed like it violated the “zombie rules” - again, taking away some of the identity of the zombie. Lastly, some of the infected could control their urges to feast on human flesh, displaying some consciousness. The whole terror of being infected is that you will turn into an uncontrollable, dead cannibal. That is part of the zombie mythos and (although I enjoyed the notion and different direction) I felt that it also detracted from the character and made the zombies less scary. I don't want to beat a dead horse but if any one of those single qualities were in place (except for the speaking), the zombies would have been better. The combination of those four things just didn't work, for the film.
Gnawing through the flesh: DOTD2 had some positive qualities, but there were pretty evenly balanced with the negatives. Aside from that, it did have some gory moments of zombie feasting but they weren't that satisfying, due to the zombie qualities I mentioned above. I did enjoy the hospital setting and the cinematography was well done, but a little change of scenery would have been nice (it's a pretty long stretch in the single setting of the psychiatric ward). Other than that, the acting wasn't bad, with Baranyay giving a solid performance as Emma and Andreas Van Ray doing a nice job as the creepy Dr. Heller. Finally, the ending of the film wasn't bad and it explored the idea that there may have been a cure for it all – which is interesting speculation. I give DAY OF THE DEAD 2: CONTAGIUM a 5/10.