Episode 381: Hello Zombie! (2014)

A low budget Japanese indie with a runtime of 45 minutes this follows the well trodden path of a production company making a zombie movie only for then the zombie apocalypse to actually happen around them. It is rarely done well, I am thinking the godawful Reel Zombies as well as Diary of the Dead, one of George's lesser movies.

In this move, bought on Amazon for £3.99, Dom, Tommy and Gen are friends who run an independent production company that has had it's day. They have no money and so are making a zero budget zombie movie in Okinawa. After filming a scene they head into the woods, and a cursed copse where a real zombie attacks and kills their lead actor, before chasing the other into town.

Add a funny scene of a drunk avoiding death, and a LOT of blood sprayed over everyone, and this low budget short is actually quite watchable. 

I would give it 5/10.

Transcript

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SPEAKER_00 0:00

And welcome back, dear listeners. I am back again. I am I am back again. You're welcome. Darren Smith for the Undead Symphony. I know it's been a while. Okay, I do appreciate that it has been a bit of a while since um since the last time. I mean, I'm recording less, uh, and I know you would have said seen that I'm recording less, but I am making a movie, and that's the thing. I'm making a movie. Um, as you will know, the the Dragel of the Dead uh did start off as uh a bit of fun. Um just me writing a script, uh trying to make stuff myself rather than you know in in the way in the in the you know the the maelstrom of AI that has suddenly appeared upon us. Um I just wanted to make something with my hands, and so built the sets, built the characters, uh filmed it all myself, did all the editing, found all the music, got all the licenses, and more recently uh it's grown to have ten different actors and a professional violinist, a poster artist, a graffiti artist, 3D modellers and 3D printers. I hope it's gonna be good. I mean at least at least it's a bit gonna be a bit of fun, and that is what we're watching today. A bit of fun. Uh but before we get on to the bit of fun, there's very few new movies around. Actually, this bit of fun we're talking about came out in 2014, uh, but it's only just been available to us. So, there are no new movies, right? So Zed Mum from Cambodia, it should have been our 45th country or 50 45th country back in the day, but it's now be like our 53rd, 54th country. Uh, nowhere to be seen. Zed Mum. Nowhere to be seen to a point where and it was made for Netflix, right? Netflix put any old shit on, but no, no Zed Mum. Um, I actually even emailed the company that made Zed Mum and said, hey, can can I get a screener uh just to watch it because I want to see it, and they didn't come back. People are rude. I'll tell you, tell you who else is rude. Um I uh when I started making Drake of the Dead, I always had this cast in mind. Um Daniel Hirsch as Eli, the central character, and is is Eli in in my movie. But then for the other characters, so Morty Meiselman, I originally wanted um uh Uncle uh Uncle Lloyd Kaufman. Um so I mailed uh emailed him and didn't hear back. I also emailed John Russo and didn't hear back, and so instead I I cast uh Rob Stoller, um who did a a a brilliant job uh as uh Morty Meiserman. Um I also uh I really wanted um uh Isabel uh Levine to play Ruthie Frankel originally. I mean the original uh Ruthie Frankel was only in one scene, but after seeing Isabel and a stand-up, I suddenly wrote seven scenes of her, uh, made her slightly autistic and the love interest of Eli. So suddenly she's like the second biggest character in the whole movie. Um she said, yeah, absolutely. She actually said, Absolutely, send me the lines, I will read them, and guess what? She didn't. And so the wonderful Tina Marie Serrat uh Sarah plays them, uh plays Ruthie now. So I've got Dan and Rob uh and Tina uh and and all the others, so Lydia and uh Frank and Hank uh and Daniel too, all involved uh in that project. So whilst mine is moving along, I'm finding it more and more difficult to find a zombie movie to watch. So I've just been on Amazon and there is nothing new for me to see. Um there's nothing new on Disney, there's nothing new on Netflix, there's nothing new on Apple TV, there's nothing new on Sky, there's nothing new on HBO, Studio Canal. Um so what does it leave? To be. So what it does is it comes down to do I want to watch the shit that is floating on the surface of the cesspool that is to be, or do I want to pay Amazon cash money to watch a shitty movie? I mean, we are waiting, are we not, for the gender swap night of the living dead that is actually already out. People have already seen this, and it is already being withdrawn from cinemas and is not on any streaming service. It is that shit. Return of the Living Dead remake, not out till Halloween. So where does it leave us? Well, galloping up Diarrhea Drive without a saddle, or waiting for the supposed World War Z2, which is never going to happen. Not in a million years is Brad Pitt gonna make World War Z2. Cause there's no story to tell. Instead, I'm just gonna sulk, and when I see a movie appear on Shudder or Amazon that I haven't covered yet, even if it's one I've seen before, I shall watch it. Even if it is paying cash money to watch it. And so this is the latter. This is the paying cash money rather than finding it on Tubi, and I am watching the 2014 Japanese Hello Zombie, which cost me £3.99, which is about $5. Hello Zombie, also known by its Japanese title Hasai Zombie, is a 2014 Japanese comedy horror film directed by Sochi Takayama. Uh the story follows a broke independent film crew that goes to Okinawa to shoot what could be their last zombie movie, only for the chaotic production to spiral into a real life disaster. How many times have we seen that? Dom and his unsuccessful indie film crew are shooting a trashy zombie flick in Okinawa, which, due to a lack of funding, will probably be their last. When some holy grounds become the location of the shoot, they find the perfect prop. A real zombie, and so this is the classic. They're making a zombie movie, and then the real zombie apocalypse happens. How many times have we seen that? Too many times is the answer, but it's always entertaining. It gets 5 out of 10 on IMDB, which is very middle of the road, but it is Japanese, which can be very hit and miss. So looking at the other ten Japanese movies that we have seen, I Am a Hero and One Cut of the Dead are head and shoulders above the rest on 6.5 out of 10, making them both incredibly watchable, re-watchable, and recommendable. Miss Zombie, 6 out of 10. If you want a black and white art piece, it's actually very good. Uh, Versus and Wild Zero, two very fun zombie movies with gangsters and a rock band and aliens and lots of other craziness on 5.5 out of 10. Schoolgirl Apocalypse and Tokyo Zombie, just tooth off the wall for my liking, 4.5. Zom 100, a bucket list of the dead that some people fucking love when they love the eight-legged shark. But I just found Hero running around screaming, or not Hero, was it Hero? Uh or was it Akira? It was one of those generic names. Uh running around screaming on the top at the top of his voice all the time, just too annoying. Junk was junk and 3.5 out of ten, but every day of the dead, which I saw recently, um, which was an anthology, was the bottom of the pile with 2 out of 10. That has it festering right at the bottom, uh, with all the other shit, you know, you know the movies I mean. His sien of the dead from Singapore and Oasis of the Zombies uh from France, uh the um yeah, and all that. The English Attack of the Flatulating Dead, shotgun with the zombie with a shotgun, or shotgun with a zombie. Either way, it's awful. So there are five passes based on our scoring of over five and five fails. And if you actually take the average of the ten movies, it actually is four point eight out of ten. So the average of movies for the country of Japan is four point eight out of ten. So Japan ain't South Korea when it comes to all things Zeke. I'll should probably do a table of the 50 country, 50 something countries that we've covered with an average score, because even though the US has arguably some of the greatest zombie movies ever made, they also have a lot of the worst. So I'm sure their score is gonna be way down at the bottom. Uh anyway, that aside, uh, there is a big gap in quality sometimes. Uh the Japanese and their off-the-wall craziness doesn't always translate. I mean, Tokyo Zombie was penned as or publicised as the Japanese Shaun of the Dead, which it isn't. But let's see, this is only 45 minutes long as well, which can be a curse, uh, but it could also be a godsend. 45 minutes long or 45 minutes short. That's the heart glass, half full or empty for you. Um, but it does actually make me happy for some reason because it is getting late at night. I am a little bit tired because the dog woke me up at 3 in the morning to take a shit outside. Um, because he wanted to be let out. And so I am a little bit tired. So 45 minutes is perfect for me. So this is the Undead Symphony with me, David Smith, and this is episode 381, in which I watch Hello, Zombie!

SPEAKER_01 10:33

Hey, this is Alan Mansprang, who played Sergeant Nicotine Crockett in Survival of the Dead and Diary of the Dead. And also Groovaker in Land of the Dead.

SPEAKER_03 10:42

This is John Russo, writer of Night of the Living Dead. I'm Lori Cardell, and I played Sarah in George A. Romero's Day of the Dead.

SPEAKER_02 10:51

Hi, this is Ken Ford, Peter, from 1978's Dawn of the Dead. Arguably the greatest zombie movie ever made.

SPEAKER_03 11:00

And you're listening to Darren and Michael on the Undead Symphony. The Undead Symphony.

SPEAKER_02 11:08

The Undead Symphony. Thank you.

SPEAKER_00 11:28

So I've seen it. I will say it was 45 minutes long, but it does involve there's sort of like a five-minute scene uh right at the end of a shopping mall where it's just loads of zombies there. It's nothing to do with the entire with the plot. It's just like a ton of zombies in a shopping mall. Um, so uh yes, 45 minutes long. Um and as it started, I I think I thought I'd already seen this. So maybe I actually, it's one of these movies where um on Amazon they don't have a trailer, so they just have a clip as the trailer, and maybe I watched that clip as the trailer, and now I'm remembering having seen that and deciding not to watch it, but this time I'm watching it, so um uh that's that's what I've kind of worked out. So we start with a I've difficult to say either a drummer or a priest. He's basically got a drum and a big stick, and he's wearing this very elaborate old-looking costume, and he's running with a cute-looking girl. This is the Sean and Sarah, who are running along, and then they see a zombie that's played by Koja, who's wearing a suit and glasses, stumbling towards them in a park. They think that if they do this particular chant together and beat the drum, it will kill the zombie and bring the end of the zombie apocalypse. So they do this chant and beat the drum, and then the zombie falls over. And this is a B movie that is being made by an independent company that is a group of friends. The zombie actor Koja asks for notes. He's doing the straight arms thing. You know the straight arms thing that you know mummies used to do in movies and and Frankenstein. Uh actually, anything dead would do the whole straight arms thing with the loose hands. Um, and so he's doing that. Um, Sean then heads off and goes missing. So, what we have is Sean and Koja and Sarah, who are the actors. Uh, we have Dom, who is the director, his best friend Tommy is the director of photography and the cameraman, and Jen is their big friend who is the lighting guy. They don't have a sound guy for some reason. Um, as they're looking for for Sean, who's disappeared now after his scene, uh, because basically his uh the zombie arrives and attacks Sarah and then he runs off. Uh his character runs off. So um he's kind of you know supposed to be apologetic about you know running away, even though he said that he loves her. Um so Sean and uh and Tommy are gonna go and try to find sorry, Dom and Tommy are trying to find the director and the photographer are trying to find Sean. Um and Tommy's like, Do we just not have any talent? Because we haven't got any money and we can't make any more movies after this. And I'm getting pressure to marry my girlfriend and get a proper job. They then find one of Sean's robes, and you know, to be fair, the acting is a little bit poor, the cinematography is a little bit poor. Uh, and but then from nowhere, Sean jumps on them, but he isn't a zombie, it was a laugh, and he was just trying to make them jump. Sean says, Look, come come this way, come this way. I found this really creepy part of the forest that we should film our next scenes in, and it turns out that this is hallowed ground, it is cursed ground. There is a sign, but it isn't translated for us. I'm guessing the sign tells us what kind of curse it is. Uh, so there the city production company that are now making an um uh a zombie movie with zero budget around town, even having no permission to do so. Um, they keep citing things like Evil Dead and Bruce Campbell and how that was zero budget too, and they want to be like that. So they say, you know, we're not amateur amateurs, we're independ we're indie. So independent means that it is low budget, amateurs amateur-ish makes it sound bad. And it does. If you're an amateur, you're amateurish. If you're an indie, you're just low budget. That's the argument, anyway. So I mean this this is this isn't one cut of the dead. I will just tell you that now. Um, but then a real zombie follows them into the woods, and rather than the makeup that Koja did himself whilst doing the straight arms, this zombie, who is an actual zombie, has really good zombie makeup. He's got the art the the um the contact lenses, blood everywhere, genuine zombie makeup and roaring. Uh it looks pretty good. So Sean is they you know, Sean is like, okay, so what's the next scene? And Dom is like, okay, so this is the scene where you're gonna be attacked by a zombie, you're gonna fight him, but then this is where you die, you get bitten on the neck. So what I suddenly thought was, well, a wit that real zombie's gonna turn up. Sean's gonna think he's an actor, they're gonna fight, he's gonna end up being bitten on the neck by a real zombie. And that's exactly what happens. Sean is there doing the scene. The real zombie's also wearing a suit, much like Kojo is, uh, isn't wearing glasses like Koja, and is much taller and an actual real zombie. The zombie comes in, they fight. He thinks he's just an actor. Uh Sean does, but then it bites right into Sean's arm, spraying blood over everyone, and it's really gruesome and really well done. Excellent practical effects. Koja then comes on set and is like, is there another zombie? Have you hired another zombie actor? So he wants to get so he wants to be a good zombie actor, so he goes and kneels down next to the real zombie, and they have this screaming contest where he's like, but then the actual zombie's like and like much better at it than him. Uh and then he still thinks his acting, uh, Kojar does, because the the zombie then bites Sean and starts pulling his intestines out, proper balloon in animal intestines, and then Koja starts chewing on the intestine, thinking, thinking it's a prop. But it's not a prop, and he suddenly realized that this is actually blood and guts, and he gets up with the other guys and they run off. Um so the director, Dom, suddenly, you know, basically went, uh Oh no, so they went up when they run into town. They all run into town suddenly, you know, they they appear in town, in an alleyway. The zombie is behind them, slowly coming after them, and they're like, shit, shit, shit, shit, shit. We need to keep going. But that's but what looks like a zombie's ahead of them. This is guy who's stumbling around. So Koja grabs a piece of wood, goes up to the what they think is a second zombie, and clump him on the head, but it turns out it's actually just the drunk guy. There is an amusing shot, and I've got to give him kudos for this, where um the the the zombie keeps trying to like grab the drunk guy, but as he tries to grab the drunk guy, the drunk guy stumbles and kind of trips, and they kind of do this almost like a choreographed dance of missing each other before the drunk just kind of d wanders off. Um which is actually really done well, I have to say, it was really done well. Uh let me do a quick sip of my coat. The zombie starts reacting to Koja, the zombie uh actor, and it's actually starts mimicking what he's doing. So Tommy and Dom and Dom and Jen are like, hmm, I think we could be on to something here. So Tommy goes over and Tommy does karate and basically starts showing some punches and kicks, and the zombie repeats them. So they're like, Hold on, I think we're on to a winner here. So of course they're gonna use the zombie in the movie. Tommy gets dressed in Sean's costume, because obviously Sean's dead, uh, and uh decides then they film this fight where sh Tommy as the priest drummer fights the zombie, punches and kicks, punches and kicks, punches and kicks. Uh it's really good, actually. And then Don the director yells cut, the zombie continues to attack. Jen, who is the uh the big guy who holds the light, the lighting, the light and the reflecting uh the reflecting panel, uh runs on runs and grabs the zombie and says, When the director yells cut, you stop, and then he's bitten on the arm by the zombie. Tommy then goes all martial arts on the zombie and the zombie then rips off Tommy's arm again, spraying blood over everybody. Uh to which they all scream and Tommy asks Where's my arm? Before he decapitates that zombie with a spade. Now you will remember we had Sarah at the beginning of the movie. She is kind of cute, but she was kind of gone for most of it. And now she's walking along a shopping street, and there are zombies in front of her, there are zombies behind her, she didn't notice them, and now the horde is congregating towards her, so there's a bit of tension with her trying to get through a fence. She gets through the f a gate, sorry, gets through the gate, she unbolts it, gets through, and then bolts it again, not seeing a giant fat zombie who is waiting for her. She just stares at the giant fat zombie as the horde of zombies behind her come through the gates and she goes down, killed by the horde. The guys are now wandering the streets covered in blood. They are all very tired. Tommy, to be fair, has had his arm ripped off. Says, I'm really tired. Can we just wait for a minute? So let's pause. So the guy says, Yeah, yeah, yeah, we'll just we'll just chill out. Uh, and then a horde comes from all angles. Tommy is bitten on the neck and dies. Which makes Dom go absolutely nuts because he was his best friend. So Dom grabs an axe, which is just laying there to one side, gives the camber to Koja, and then he attacks and it looks like kills all of the zombies, but these weren't headshots, so the zombies are all just laying down and moaning and groaning, laying where they were hit. Um cut to darkness now, and Koja is still filming, Jen is holding. holding uh the lamp above uh dom as dom and they're going through one of those like small uh covered markets uh or like you know it's like it's not like a shopping mall um it well it is kind of like a shopping mall but you know sort of like those m those little it's sort of white it's sort of it's got like a winding narrow passages and tiny little box shaped shops uh one of those like enclosed markets and he is killing these zombies and attacking them with all his might whilst being filmed at doing so uh and to be fair he's looking exhausted and I feel exhausted for him because he does look like he put a lot of effort into that they manage to come out of the the sh the enclosed market smoke shopping mall and come out and then sit in the middle of the street and they're like is it safe and then Koja shows that he's been bitten on the wrist um Dom shows that he's been bitten on the forearm and uh Jen shows that he's also been bitten on the arm. So all three of them been bitten and then they laugh. We then cut to this courtesan zombie or dancer zombie who is kind of like doing this weird zombie dance as she walks through the corridors and over the zombies holding an arm in her hand um which was just weird to like weird music. We then get this shopping mall scene of all the zombies five minutes of it literally five minutes of all these zombies congregating in a Japanese shopping mall I mean it is uh in honour of you know George A Romero shopping mall classic but is it really needed it is to pad it out um however from my perspective at the moment it's all about keeping it under 30 minutes I know that some festivals have a 40 minute cutoff but this was already 43 so um I would have probably cut that bit out it isn't really needed so or certainly not in the length that it was and now we have the guys and the guys are still trying to make a zombie movie despite the fact that they are now zombies um so Sarah who is a zombie walks past and shouts no as Koja the zombie attacks her and pretends to bite her as the one armed tomb Tommy films them uh zombie zombie tom he films them uh zombie jen holds the reflecting panel and zombie dom shouts cut before saying something along the lines that you know they are giving off the air of the living kind of thing and that was it that was the end of the movie and it was it was fun it was watchable it was short it was independent very it was certainly better than the American version what was the American version real zombies was it called yeah I mean there were lots of movies like this where someone is making a movie a zombie movie and then the zombie apocalypse happens Diary of the Dead George A Romero's awful fifth movie was uh fifth zombie movie was a zombie movie being made in the middle of a zombie apocalypse kind of ting um it's a zob it's a subgenre within the genre isn't it this one was alright though even though it was independent it could have easily been zero budget um it does feel like they didn't necessarily get permission to do a lot of this or if they did it was like hey can we just do this after hours and then tidy up after ourselves kind of thing. The Japanese do that I mean you have to remember at the World Cup the Japanese fans tidied up the stadia after they um after their team played um so where where is this in the uh the uh this is the 11th zombie movie um the 10 others I only have two of them that are really good then a couple of them that were okay and then some shittier ones and average ones and if the average is four point eight out of those ten movies this is a little bit better than the average for Japan so I'm actually gonna send it down the middle of the road and say that the 2014 Hello Zombie um the forty five minute short movie deserves five out of ten we'll walk the