Let’s make something absolutely clear up front — Survival Of The Dead is garbage. I rate it Red Blood, and it is on my List Of Zombie Films To AVOID.
What’s worse than that is that it clearly had a chunk of money behind it — not loads, but more money than many zombie films — which in my mind was money that could have been split to make at least 2 other cleverly-made lower budget better films.
The Core Problem — No Story
My impression of Survival Of The Dead is that someone — maybe their name was George — had a stack of admittedly clever zombie gags written down and sitting in a pile. This person wanted to use these in a film, but didn’t otherwise know how to pull it off — which frankly is what they should have done and just left well enough alone. However, they got together with their buddies — possibly there were a few beers in the room, possibly a few too many — and they had a brainstorming session that amounted to… “Okay, we’ll use the military ’cause that always flies in zombie films — oh, and to help it sell, everything Irish is popular right now, so let’s throw that in too!” Having concocted a shoddy story-line they got their funding and started rolling.
My guess is that’s how Survival Of The Dead got its start. But what, no gratuitous possibly-future-famous Z-film breasts to further sell this potboiler?!? I like bad film, but in this case I would prefer that whoever green-lighted this project read my review: don’t waste your company’s money and don’t waste the audience’s time.
The Story — Lacking Though It May Be…
Zombies have taken over the world. A ragtag band of soldiers roams the countryside to scavenging to survive. The unit is intrigued when they hear of a safe haven on an island off the coast of North America. Expecting to find a paradise, they instead find the island is torn apart by a wannabe Hatfield–McCoy family feud. One family wants to exterminate the zombies while the other thinks everyone can peacefully coexists with their undead relatives hoping for a cure to return their relatives back to their human state.
This turd is directed by George A. Romero. At least you’ll recognize Kenneth Welsh.
Toward the end two survivors who where military broke into a civilian firearms store — there are a few problems with this…..