Blinded by the Light

Død Snø (2009)

Dead Snow started slow

but as the blood began to flow

got its mojo

Bruce Campbellesque

with chainsaw twists

nazi zombies rein high

Ein! Zwei! Die!

Ah poetry, ist gut innit?

I have to say any promo poster that has a fine specimen of nazi zombie manhood decapitated but still looking like he means business is a winner in my book.

With a poster that triumphs as does the punchy tagline I was quite the happy camper looking forward to a good ole nazi zombie love-in.

So when the premise is a group of Norwegian mates from medical school head off to a remote cabin for a spot of winter sports and general naughtiness, of course it's going to end badly.  They get the usual warnings from an odd-ball traveller by night making an impromptu visit but proceed to write him off as just another random weirdo that you get round these here parts.  A faux pas shall we say.

I have admit in the early stages I did begin to wonder if my initial excitement was a little premature, for a movie set in the snow there seemed to be an awful lot happening in the dark.  Which in theory is fine from an atmospheric 'building a sense of impending doom' point of view but not when it's so dark there is no peril to be seen and frankly my squinting wasn't producing much...  This, combined with the nagging internal question of 'where are all the fucking zombies?' was beginning to get me a tad despondent.  The memorable toilet shagging scene aside (which I thought was an inventive way of bringing scat to mainstream cinema) I started to think maybe I'd been duped by a beautiful poster promising me so much yet here I was in the dark watching, well the dark and thinking about scat.  Not ideal.

But then the daylight came and all was revealed.  I'm pleased to say with it the story picked up a notch and we were all systems go, chainsaws a flingin,' limbs a tearin', disembowelin' a plenty with a generous splattering of ruby red blood against a backdrop of glorious white.  It was all on the up.  Good looking zombies too.  A nod to Evil Dead thrown in and a healthy dose of gallows humour all helped to put a smile back on my face.

 This is one instance where I will say light triumphs over dark.