Rise of the Undead (2005 Video) User Reviews

Just plain boring.

[gsh999 · 3/10 · 17 May 2006]

OK - I gave it a "3" just because they obviously had no money to make this film, but I feel it might deserve the "2.3" rating it had when I got here. I'm actually helping to raise it's rating, despite being bored for the last hour and a half. I will save the "1's" and the "2's" for the higher budget pieces of crap. At least the makers of "Rise of the Undead" didn't waste that much money. They did manage to waste 90 minutes of my life.

The movie is too claustrophobic for me. The entire movie takes place in the same building, in dark rooms and hallways. With a setting like this, there should have been more action or character development, but there is just a lot of meaningless talk. I didn't get to know any of the characters. There is a schoolgirl and a Goth chick but we never find out much more about them. None of the characters seem really likable.

Terrible movie made on zero budget. No scary special effects. No suspense. Really nothing interesting at all here, folks. I admit I downloaded this from the net. It was free but I am throwing it away.

Sorry to the filmmakers. Better luck next time. This one is more like a soap opera than a zombie movie.

This cheese stinks!

[CHUDtheBUD · 1/10 · 7 September 2005]

Hey, I'm a fan of so-bad-so-good movies but there's nothing so-bad-so-good about Rise Of The Undead. It's just so-bad and that's it. No redeeming cheese, no unintentional humor, nothing! - boring apocalyptic Zombie (The "Undead" : a few people with hardly any make up) nonsense with lame special effects (if you can call those effects), dumb plot and annoying actors. They also have the nerve to rip off and quote from other (better) movies (Resident Evil, Dawn Of The Dead & Night Of The Comet) and managed to put me to sleep on the side. However, it was Rise Of My Eyelids once the end credits rolled though. My advice: save your money. It's not even worth a rental, unless you want to p*ss off and/or put some people to sleep then go ahead and give it a spin. You've been warned ;)

A pretentious lot of crap

[maledictum · 1/10 · 24 March 2006]

So, you've seen the Romero movies, yes? And you've seen Jacob's Ladder, right? And the later Hellraiser movies? Okay, now let's make a movie out of all three, only let's just jam everything together and make a whole big mess of it, sounds like a good idea?

This movie is terrible. Absolutely god-awful. Yeah, it's an indie flick, who gives a crap? Is that a pass to make filmic excrement? The film attempts to establish credibility by focusing on character interaction, that much is evident. Unfortunately for the writers, they're not good at character interaction. This isn't Night of the Living Dead; the characters are nonentities shouting their inane lines at each other in a vain attempt to be caught by the microphones on set. The dialogue is never interesting. For a movie that focuses so much on character interaction, you'd think the characters would have something more to say than "WHAT ARE WE GOING TO DO" "I don't know" "WELL WE'VE GOT TO DO SOMETHING" "Well what are we going to do?" "I DON'T KNOW." "We should leave." "LET'S JUST ACCEPT OUR FATE." "No, we've got to leave." "WELL LET'S LEAVE THEN." "No, maybe we should stay."

This isn't exaggeration, there are exchanges in this film that reach that level of redundancy and inanity.

The worst thing about this movie? Half of it is a dream, and it really has zero purpose. Nothing in the dream has any relevance to anything in the rest of the movie. The writers couldn't decide whether to make a zombie movie or a monster movie and so they just made both. It's patently ridiculous, the cheapest trick in the book, and it's maddeningly insulting, especially since I'm pretty sure they ripped off the idea from Jacob's ladder, which handled the concept a hell of a lot more competently than these jokers could ever hope to do.

And then there's the editing. Years of watching MTV and playing horror-themed video games must have inspired the filmmakers, but it's surely a sad thing they didn't realize what made the choppy editing and obfuscation in those pieces of media effective in the first place. In this film, you will be confused often, and not in the good, David Lynch way, but in the bad "Wait I thought she just got killed, no? Then who the hell was that? Wait, who is that guy? Where did he come from? How did they get here?" kind of way. It's constant and consistently bad.

This movie is a laughable piece of trash and should only be sought out if you want to get trashed with a few friends and laugh at it.

And as a final note: as for the "comedy" people in other reviews are talking about, it's all unintentional. There isn't a single intentional piece of comedy in this film. It's all supposed to be a big serious character study, because the filmmakers want to have credibility in their horror-concept. Sadly, their pretensions don't match up to their ability.

Boredom rising.

[Ky-D · 4/10 · 30 July 2005]

Zombie movies are hot, I love 'em. Can't get enough. Why I would purchase a film of this caliber goes without explanation, I just really love zombies. Surprise, this really isn't much of a zombie movie; low-budget I can handle, being duped just irritates me.

A group of horror-film clichés hold up in a warehouse/lab/who-knows-what to escape a fire storm outside. Panic, yelling, low-light, and (eventually) zombies ensue.

I kind of feel bad for the film makers, as it is obvious that they really thought they were putting together something good; a serious, scary horror film. It isn't, far from it, it's a boring mess of wooden acting, cheesy FX, poor lighting, excessive dialogue, and over editing.

Things first go awry when it takes a good 10+ minutes for the characters to ever sit down and start to figure out what is going on. It gets worse when another 20 minutes go by and they are still sitting around trying to figure out what is going on. All of this is littered with non-acting and bad dialogue.

Finally some one gets attached (not by a zombie though) and hope flickers just a touch before the characters are again lounging around whining (the only emotion any one every generates) about how much this sucks. Me too guys, me too.

Finally zombies are in the mix, but no one watching cares any more. I think there was some blood and gore tossed in, but I was too busy praying for the credits to roll to notice. And when the screen finally did fade to black I felt even more cheated by the pointlessly 'Cube' inspired ending.

I will give credit for trying very hard, even if it failed miserably. That and the punk chick was very hot if totally under used.

Can't really recommend this to anyone, save for film students looking for 'no-no' pointers.

4/10

good little horror movie

[horrormovieguy · 4/10 · 14 June 2005]

This has got to be the cheapest movie of it's kind I have ever seen. It looks like it cost about 50 bucks. But, they still blew up buildings, had a fire storm, a cg monster, and a shot that traveled through a guys chest and came out the other side. Sure none of it looked a million bucks. But, hey you work with what you got. And I'd say these guys got quite a bit out of their 23 dollars. I was expecting a splatter show or zombie movie. It had a little of both, but not a whole lot of either. The acting was so-so for the most part. I did like the crazy dude with the purple vest, and the guy in the suit. He played a good jerk. The guy with the axe was an alright action star some day. I'm not so sure about the pony tailed guy. All in all it was a good movie, for a 27 dollar movie. But hey, maybe for their next film they'll get $30.

It's a siege not a zombie movie

[barb1999-1 · 13 June 2005]

Rio Bravo, From Dusk Til Dawn, Assault on P.13, Feast, Dual at Diablo, Princess of Darkness, Rise of the Undead. They are siege movies, several characters trapped together in a singular location, besieged by the forces of darkness. Rise of the Undead is a siege picture at it's most basic. Neither the characters or the monster are given faces. Sure there's several characters running around yelling at each other, but they remain mostly nameless. It's a bold move on the part of the filmmakers to strip the genre to it's essentials. And it's a move that doesn't always work. Leaving out characterization leaves the audiences feeling nothing for the characters, and as a result the movie loses a much needed sense of urgency. What's left however, is a hell of a story. Strangers trapped in a building during an apocalypse, hunted down by an unseen menace. There is also a very off beat and assured sense of humor working here. The awkward pauses aren't bad editing. They are deliberate and often gut busting funny digs at the characters and the genre itself. Anyone expecting a walking dead movie is going to be sorely disappointed, although the middle (and most exciting) section of the movie does feature some zombies. The performance are all handle delicately, the directors tone down the performances to almost non-existent. There are no great thespians here. It's a wise move to underplay.

This is Armageddon & not the f*cking movie!" Don't bother.

[poolandrews · 3/10 · 26 November 2007]

Rise of the Undead starts as some huge nuclear type blast rips through an unnamed American city, a few people survive in a building by leaning on the door so it'll stay closed & keep the nastiness out(!). They argue amongst themselves for ages, then a monster thing arrives from seemingly nowhere & begins to kill them of one-by-one...

Written, produced & directed by Jason Horton & Shannon Hubbell one has to say Rise of the Undead is terrible. The script takes itself very seriously but makes little sense, the first thing I asked myself was if there's this huge nuclear blast type thing going on outside destroying the entire city why are these people I'm watching still alive? Why is the building they are in still standing? Then I asked myself when was something actually going to happen, the entire first 20 minutes is set in one room, actually that's a bit generous it's more of a corridor as the main character's argue. Then it turns into some Return of the Living Dead (1985) rip-off with a Government created virus which turns people into zombies before one of the most abrupt, pointless & seemingly random plot twists I've ever witnessed which renders most of what has just happened a complete waste of time. Then for the final 30 odd minutes Rise of the Undead turns into some strange sci-fi type thing as something which resembles a ball of energy floats around killing everyone, was I the only asking what this floating ball of energy thing is & where it came from? Getting back to what was happening outside what was the reason again? Oh that's right we are never told. Rise of the Undead is a mess, the character's are awful & aren't even given names, the twist about halfway through will have you tearing your hair out in frustration, the dialogue sucks, nothing is explained & there's virtually no story here. The final 10 minutes (maybe a bit more) of Rise of the Undead features no dialogue whatsoever & the film just suddenly ends.

Director's Horton & Hubbell were obviously working on a low budget, the entire film is set in about two rooms & three corridors! The photography is awful, they use annoying colour filters seemingly at random & sometimes it really does look like Rise of the Undead was shot on a camcorder. There's no special effects, there's some fake blood splashed around but no actual make-up effects to speak of. There are some CGI shots of the city being engulfed in flames which look alright but the floating ball of energy creature thing looks terrible. There is one baffling shot early on where two people are sitting against a corridor wall & talking, for some bizarre reason their heads are cut off at the top of the screen! Just their lower bodies from the neck down are seen yet nothing else is happening in frame, they are not moving & there's no else there but for some strange reason their heads are cut off the top of the frame as they talk to each other! It's quite an odd thing to watch actually.

With an ultra low budget of about $10,000 & according to the IMDb shot in two weeks I have to congratulate the makers for getting Rise of the Undead finished & distributed but that's where my congratulations stop because otherwise this has awful production values & is set in about three corridors which are located somewhere in New Orleans in Louisiana as that's where Rise of the Undead was shot. The acting sucks so I won't dwell on it.

Rise of the Undead sucks, it sounds like a zombie film but in all honestly it isn't, everything about it is sub par & I know the filmmakers were working on a low budget but that's not really an excuse as far as I'm concerned. Definitely not recommended.

It blew.

[bnsmith89 · 1/10 · 4 April 2008]

With the Terrible acting, the awful dialog, the multitude of bad humor, the crappy plot and over terrible film. This has to be the worst film i have ever viewed in my life, and i'm the king of finding bad movies. For the effects, they just threw fake blood on people and things, didn't spend the time to create wounds and make special effects worth anything. Most people making low budget horror flicks at least do something like clads of tissue or something to make a gashing wound. The dialog was far from even decent and the acting was without direction or effort. They just threw some actors on a set and said, have at it. I swear i've seen better films from my film I class at school. How did this ever get a DVD release?

No, it's not worth a peek

[knightc6 · 1/10 · 23 December 2008]

I can't give it less than a star, I tried. At this moment, Im not sure if Im halfway through it or not, but I stopped actively paying attention around the time part of it was revealed to be a dream. Or not. Or maybe it was. I think viewers who posted a comment that didn't include the descriptions "horrible" or "awful" or "made me want to swallow a bullet" are probably being nice because it is an indie film. Don't listen to them, listen to me- there is no nudity in the movie, skip it. I needed ten lines to submit this warning, so I will also say that the goth girl that some users have described as "hot" is fat. She has fat elephant legs.

Worse than awful!

[rwirtz-2 · 1/10 · 9 September 2005]

This is the worst movie I've ever seen. Boring, illogical, terrible. Don't waste even a minute in your life to watch this crap! I hope the directors won't make any other movie because this movie bankrupts them. The movie seems to be created in one or two days with some friends of the directors (if we can use this word for these 2 guys). They use only camera in hand. Many scenes are in darkness and nothing can be seen. Lots of scenes (80% of the movie) are with conversation only. ! There are movies like Vampire vs. Zombies which you can laugh on but this one is simply bad, no point to making such movies. Please, stop Jason Horton and Shannon Hubbel. Don't make more movies!

dark, trippy occasionally funny

[chainoffear · 9/10 · 9 July 2005]

Rise of the Undead. After some trying visual effects our mostly nameless main characters spend about 15 minutes bitching at each other after seeking refuge in a self storage facility from the apocalypse. After one of them gets the bright idea to leave, they embark on a poisidenesque adventure through the building, to the other side, where....they can't get out anyway, and then have to fight the mysterious creature that has been stalking them throughout.

The interesting thing about this film is the journey never happens. Well, it does, but not on screen or in the way you're thinking. Confused? Probably. The entire second act of the film is a dream sequence in the head of the most passive character. An effeminate young man named Jim. In the sequence the group is besieged by zombies and are killed off one by one until only Jim and a catholic school girl remain. Then they share what must be cinema's most uncomfortably long kiss, in what has to be the funniest scene i've seen in a while. (hopefully intentionally so)

This is a no budget thriller. NO BUDGET. It looks and sounds very cheap. But it is the ideas contained within that peaked my interest. It was a solid, if somewhat technically inept effort.

Low Budget, but OK anyway

[goatthought · 6/10 · 16 April 2005]

i've seen a lot of really low budget flicks in my day. Rise of the Undead is definitely a low budget flick. i'm guessing they shot this for next to nothing. but the question is, is it worth watching? The answer is... yes. It's a really cool idea for a movie. A group of people trapped in a large building, during an apocalypse, being hunted down by an unseen creature. Add a catholic school girl, buckets o'blood, a sex crazed psycho, and some zombie to boot, that's spells fun in my book. It gets a bit slow in parts, and has a fair share of technical errors. But it's overall worth the view.

Sure the acting is spotty. And they shot it on a camera of the dv variety. but it sure has an assured sense of style and sense of humor. if nothing else i can't wait to see what these kids do for their next flick.

Bob out.

Indie zombie nonsense

[Leofwine_draca · 1/10 · 20 September 2017]

RISING UNDEAD is another indie zombie movie made without any originality or interesting intent. In was made in 2005 so in terms of technical qualities it looks much more dated than the modern indies they're making today. The story involves a bunch of characters hiding out in a warehouse during the zombie apocalypse. As tensions rise inside, a horde of zombies try to get in from the outside. Unfortunately, this is a film marred by horrid acting, a rubbish storyline with barely any action, and some truly awful computer graphics and sound effects seemingly added in "because they can".

What are you afraid of?

[lost-in-limbo · 23 April 2007]

Occurring outside happens to be the end of the world and a small group of survivors hold up in an abandon government building form the fiery apocalypse. For the occupants, trouble also lurks inside the dark corridors of the building, where they face off against flesh-eating zombies and a far more deadlier creature that knocks them off in an instant flash, whenever darkness fills the room.

The ambitiously zero-budget straight-to-DVD horror flick is filled with ideas, but limitations and muddled ventures is what keeps them mostly at bay. What they had to work with is very little, but they make the most of it with carefully competent handling in the technical side of productions. The forlorn building location they chose to shoot at built up an tautly dreamy atmospheric air and purposely dim lighting only enhanced its doom 'n' gloom feel and hid the awaiting menace. A foreboding soundtrack was quite an jaded experience when those techno cues came alive and loud sound effects packed a punch. Being shot in digital, made sure of few moody frames (like an hectic monster POV movement) but more often is was kept reasonably humdrum. Co-directors Jason Horton and Shannon Hubbell do pretty much a workman-like job without doing anything overly laudable, but what let it down for me was the deflated story and grating performances. What was going on was quite a boring blur, and the twist half-way through was a real groaner. The dreary premise kinda reminded me of "Resident Evil", but a very poor man's version of it. Actually the zombies aren't the main draw card here, but a lesser foe and the plot wants to be a little bit more than just a zombie film. Instead what goes on seems rather pointless and unfocused, and the laconic script whines with uninteresting drivel and even less development. Hearing these moronically token characters go on and on, had me thinking "zzzzzzz". Phew! At least there was some peculiar stabs at black humour, which I didn't particularly find humorous, but it made for better listening. Very wretch and weak were the performances, that I just didn't care for their fates. The fitting CGI effects were well handled and made to good use for such a production, while the make-up was another story with very little of it and what was there was indeed scratchy. Some blood is splashed about, but never in an over-the-top manner and at times off-screen or in the dark. The thrills when they come are a mixture of cheap to creative, but waiting around for them is a killer.

Flawed, but an admirably threadbare effort by the film-makers, however it doesn't mean I got to like it. There are some promising things to take away and I like the ominous air to it, but as a whole I came from it rather unsatisfied.

Sigh...

[tpsn · 3/10 · 7 October 2018]

The violence and gore could not save this film from being another predictable apocalyptic zombie flick. B-

What is it?

[nogodnomasters · 1/10 · 8 October 2017]

A group of people hold up in what looks like a storage unit building while the city is in an infernal and zombies are roaming around. The film had a list of bads that include: acting, sound, camera angles, dialogue, and script. Chantal Koerner was annoying.

Guide: F-word. No sex or nudity. Get a punch on the hacker's card for this one.

Creepy, sinister little flick

[agentjuan · 9/10 · 14 May 2005]

A violent, sinister little film, made for perhaps less than a month's salary, but with interesting experimental sound effects and other quirks. The acting ranges from over-the-top to underwhelming, but this is a horror movie, and for a horror movie, it's not only pretty creepy and occasionally shocking, but with demented humor that comes out of left-field and never intentionally just for comic relief.

Horton and Hubbel are not as interested in the dramatics of an apocalypse. They appear to be interested more specifically in the stripping down of all things, the humanity that is at our core, and the way only the most horrible situations (an apocalypse, on top of another horror which I won't give away) brings out that core humanity. The script and camera linger on the relationships people form when surrounded and beaten down to nothing. It's interesting to watch, and creepy to behold.

This is a promising first film. This is perfect for the viewer who is interested in movies few have heard about, so as to be the first to spread the word.

B-movie fun

[rbaudie · 7/10 · 7 June 2005]

If you like so-bad-they're-good movies, I particularly recommend this flick. In the now familiar way that movies like Evil Dead 2 or Shawn of the Dead rip apart and yet stay lovingly true to the Horror tradition, this low budget film simultaneously embraces and laughs at its kitschy B-film incarnation. What does the B-movie have to offer us that the big production film doesn't? Unpredictability and edginess? Maybe. Complete lack of pretense or artistic value? Possibly closer. Remember when John Waters was more Pink Flamingos and less Cecil B. Demented? Initially it seems to be a rip off of Dawn of the Dead in its apocalyptic, stuck in a building together setting, but stick with it. It is full of more strange twists and surprises than it seems like one B-movie could hold, verging at times on the surreal. Even the lame special effects are so right for the film, that it's irrelevant to ask if they are a result of the low budget or just genius.

Good Concept, Interesting Twist..

[arielsphoto · 6/10 · 25 August 2005]

This film is defiantly unique for its genre. The characters range from mediocre to bizarre performances. The film is bit plot heavy and dialog saturated, however it does contain some ingenious plot twists and shock factors. The special effects were great for an indie and the gritty location added a lot of suspense to the film. It is defiantly not your typical "Zombie eats brains" scenario followed by a cast of big breasted bimbos and college frat guys. This film takes it a step further adding almost humorous elements and science fiction. This film has some great concepts (which I find to be a rarity these days), but elementary work. I do however see lots of potential and I will defiantly be following these two writers/directors.

Not What I Expected (Semi-Spoilers)

[sully2161 · 7/10 · 23 October 2005]

Well, this movie certainly turned out NOT to be what I expected. I've read that the title was changed by the distributor. The end credits say "Look for Jim in Shelter 2", so I kind of assume this movie was meant to be called "Shelter" originally. Having said that, I very much enjoyed the movie. At first I thought I was watching one of the films my friends & I put together. But I quickly realized that the lines and movements were well thought out and deliberate. The editing was also quite impressive (I picked up a few tricks I want to try out). The Zombie Sequence in the middle was an interesting diversion, while providing some additional insight into the (intentionally) backgroundless characters. I would recommend viewing the film at least twice, with a sharp eye out the 2nd time around.