Every now and then, I like to watch a randomly selected horror movie knowing absolutely nothing about it; most of the time, these 'blind watches' turn out to be junk, but occasionally I find a hidden gem, or at least a film that is dumb fun. Dead Squad is one such film: it's not a great film per se, but it is highly entertaining--a deliberately cheesy piece of schlock that delivers those staples of the genre, excessive gore and gratuitous nudity.
The directorial debut of movie musician Dominik Hauser, Dead Squad: Temple of the Dead (to give it it's full title) follows a group of backpackers who stray off the beaten path and discover an ancient temple where they decide to seek shelter for the night, unaware that the ruins are home to mutated flesh-eating zombie monsters, created by a Nazi scientist working for the C.I.A.
Hauser lays on the cheeze and the splatter from the word go, with a prologue set in 1958 that sees a man having his face pulled off. The action then moves to present day, but the craziness continues throughout, the bloody mayhem including an exploding stomach, mutant/zombie impalement, a jawbone ripped off, gut-munching, decapitation, and the hilarious sight of one of the backpackers having his skull pulled out of his abdomen! Busty Bianca Zouppas as sexy sightseer Tiffany provides most of the nudity, although a couple of female zombies also get flash their boobs. There's also a zombie-on-zombie blow-job and a dwarf zombie with his head buried in a female zombie's crotch!
The plot is formulaic, the acting is fairly diabolical, and the film has some of the worst scene transitions imaginable, but the plentiful blood and guts, the nekkidness, and some surprisingly effective set design all go to make Dead Squad an enjoyable time-waster--one of those rare times when taking pot luck actually payed off.
6.5/10 for the gore, rounded up to 7 for the flesh-eating dwarf (I'm a sucker for a horror film with a dwarf, even more-so if the little fellow is a zombie).
The directorial debut of movie musician Dominik Hauser, Dead Squad: Temple of the Dead (to give it it's full title) follows a group of backpackers who stray off the beaten path and discover an ancient temple where they decide to seek shelter for the night, unaware that the ruins are home to mutated flesh-eating zombie monsters, created by a Nazi scientist working for the C.I.A.
Hauser lays on the cheeze and the splatter from the word go, with a prologue set in 1958 that sees a man having his face pulled off. The action then moves to present day, but the craziness continues throughout, the bloody mayhem including an exploding stomach, mutant/zombie impalement, a jawbone ripped off, gut-munching, decapitation, and the hilarious sight of one of the backpackers having his skull pulled out of his abdomen! Busty Bianca Zouppas as sexy sightseer Tiffany provides most of the nudity, although a couple of female zombies also get flash their boobs. There's also a zombie-on-zombie blow-job and a dwarf zombie with his head buried in a female zombie's crotch!
The plot is formulaic, the acting is fairly diabolical, and the film has some of the worst scene transitions imaginable, but the plentiful blood and guts, the nekkidness, and some surprisingly effective set design all go to make Dead Squad an enjoyable time-waster--one of those rare times when taking pot luck actually payed off.
6.5/10 for the gore, rounded up to 7 for the flesh-eating dwarf (I'm a sucker for a horror film with a dwarf, even more-so if the little fellow is a zombie).