Stalled (I) (2013) User Reviews

Harmless comedy, will bring a smile or two.

[Patient444 · 6/10 · 6 November 2013]

Stalled, in my personal opinion, is actually a good comedy/horror, something that works even for girls, even for the stomach weak people, because it doesn't rely that much on gore. Of course, it has its parts, but mostly it tries to be constructive, as much as it can, especially considering the plot and somehow I think it succeed.

We all know that a janitor is trapped in a women's restroom, so if you lower your expectations a little, especially from those 2 bad reviews that are here, I think you might just laugh a little at this one. I watched it become more interesting, more humorous and smarter, therefore I do recommend such a movie. You want a real crapper, then watch "Zombie ass: toilette of the dead", you wanna have some innocent fun to pass the time, sure, give "Stallet" a try. I'm telling you, if you are a horror fan that likes to put one eye on the cross with comedy from time to time, this one will do the trick. A nice add-on to the gender.

Other horror comedies I would recommend: Dead Snow; Night of the living dorks; One eyed monster; Grabbers.

Interesting in itself, but didn't really stand out...

[paul_haakonsen · 5/10 · 1 February 2014]

I enjoy all things zombie, and check out just about everything I can come across. Now, the title of this movie, the concept of the story and the fact that it brandished "a worthy successor to Shaun of the Dead" on the front cover really had my interest peaked.

So, of course I had to give it a go. And the verdict is, well, the story has its moments, and it is one of those particular movies that is thick with British comedy. A worthy successor to "Shaun of the Dead", however, nah, I wouldn't go that far.

The story is in all its simplicity about W.C. (played by Dan Palmer), a janitor who gets trapped in a women's bathroom stall when a Christmas party takes a turn for the worse and people start turning into ravenous flesh-eating zombies.

I will say that director Christian James did have an interest approach to this movie, especially since about 95% of all the movie just takes place in a confined, cramped stall in a ladies restroom. That being said, then that limitation of location also set a heavy limitation on the movie, because it was starting to wear a bit thin towards the end.

The acting in the movie was alright, especially since the entire movie was just riding on the performance of Dan Palmer and the voice of Antonia Bernath - from two stalls over.

"Stalled" is in itself a good enough zombie movie, that should be watched at least once, if you enjoy zombie movies, as I do. However, it is not outstanding, nor is it as great as initially hyped up to be. The movie is fairly generic, and while it is not amongst the worst of zombies movies I have seen, nor can I claim that it is amongst the better of such movies.

If you need a 'zombie fix'

[dan-bgb · 6/10 · 27 November 2013]

Shaun of the Dead ? No. Waste of time ? Not if you love zombies. Everyone knows that zombies have experienced a resurgence of sorts from its heyday back in the late 70's, early 80's. Problem is, how many different ways can you tell a story involving re-animated corpses ? We've got Nazi Zombies, Ninja Zombies, Zombie Gangs, Zombies on a train, plane or automobile, etc. There's even a TV series, The Walking Dead, which simply uses zombies as a prop to distract from the real story about survivor interaction. "Stalled" is (not just) another installment in the Zombie Comedy genre, the best of which started with the above-mentioned "Shaun of the Dead" and continued with "Zombieland"... Stalled is an inventive take on the whole "holed up" premise started way back with the original; Romero's Night of the Living Dead. But instead of a farmhouse, it takes place in a women's commode. It's got it's funny bits, it's got lots of blood, and it gets right to the action; it's even has a little sexual thrill (nothing explicit); that's it's positives. What it's got going against it is, it's fairly predictable and it's just not as funny as it thinks it is...but, with zombie comedies, they've got a huge yardstick to measure up to with Shaun. For those that view zombies as just another horror character, Stalled may seem like so much crap, but for the true zombie connoisseur, it's an inventive way to tell another zombie story. Any movie that can hold your attention and (nearly) everything takes place in a restroom, must have something going for it.

A true Zombie flick where the brains are lacking from the writing to the filmmaking

[bruno-filardi · 1/10 · 5 November 2013]

Bad acting, too many "familiar places" in the story, a starting point which has NOTHING to do with ANYTHING and practically a waste of your life. 450k went out on making this thing? Jeez. And the poster brags of being "successor to Shawn of the Dead"? You wish! It's slow, the plot is filled with excessive absurdities and the "ending"... what was that for? If this were a student film, I would have gave them a B for effort. Since this were made by so-called professionals, I would have gave them a kick in the face for making me waste my time, for starters. It is pretty obvious that the ONLY other "review" (if you can call it that) was made by someone with personal interest in the creators. No one in their sane mind could say that this movie is EVEN good. The only consistency in the film is that since it takes place in a toilet the movie accurately is complete crap.

Cute idea, terrible execution - FLUSH IT!!!

[NormanCroucher · 2/10 · 4 November 2013]

A man is stuck in a toilet stall during the zombie apocalypse. Sold!

Simple and effective horror comedy concept... totally amateurish and inept execution. The disappointment here is that with some actual talent behind and in front of the camera, this could have been a real gem.

Problems begin pretty much from the opening shot when you realise the lighting and cinematography are absolutely horrid. The film achieves this really cheap and cheerless look. It resembles an episode from one of those bad teen TV soap operas from the 1990's. This should immediately alert you to the fact that you're watching student filmmakers running amok with a budget.

Uh-oh.

Okay, so the cheap look can be forgiven because this is lo-fi comedy horror stuff. Fair enough right? Surely the film will make-up for that with wit and invention and gags. Right? Right??!

No.

The next major (and most crucial) problem; the writer of "Stalled", Dan Palmer, is also its star. And this is one of those writers that fancies himself an actor. And not only does he not have the chops to carry an entire feature film by himself, he can't deliver a single line of dialogue with conviction. It's as if he's trying to remember how his script sounded in his head when he came up with the dialogue. He may as well be reading the script to himself on the toilet. He's awful. If Palmer had taken his own ego and misguided acting aspirations out of the equation, they could have cast a semi-decent comedic actor in the lead.

It starts off with the promise of a somewhat "silent" horror comedy where our main character doesn't seem to speak much, if at all. But then the dialogue kicks in and, since Dan Palmer has no idea how to keep the story going without it, we get endless "f bombs" being dropped every other sentence, horribly muddled and dull lines delivered by people who just can't act, and long interludes of Palmer monloguing and emoting with embarrassing consequences. Accentuating sentences in the wrong places, forcing emotion with no help from the clueless director, Christian James.

Add in some unconvincing zombie make-up effects and mostly unfunny gags, and you have all the ingredients of a desperate "Shaun of the Dead" knock-off without the wit, invention or the talent.

It's a shame because it's got some smart ideas and a few neat ways of sustaining its simple concept over 80 minutes. I even quite liked the punchline at the end but the journey there was so unimaginative and glib that ultimately the whole experience smacked of a bunch of student filmmakers who got a little money together and extended a short film concept into a feature.

And that's what this should have been - a student short film and nothing more.

As much as I like to support independent films, when they are this amateur and poorly executed in (almost) every area, it's advisable to warn others against crossing paths with it.

Sorry "Stalled" but you really do belong in the toilet.

Stalled

[vfxbot9 · 3/10 · 12 December 2013]

Bathrooms... our most vulnerable state. Stalled's premise is clever however, it failed to take off.

The very first minute will let you know that this is an incredibly low-budget. The lighting is awful, the sound is poorly executed, and the crew seems to have forgotten tripods exist. The lighting changes so often and the shaky camera made this movie very hard to watch.

As for the plot, Stalled can hardly be labeled as a zombie film. 1/4 of the movie is zombie survival while the other 3/4 is filled with Dan Palmer's back-story/revelations and crude jokes. Speaking of jokes, I guess you can label Stalled as a Horror-comedy. It is mainly toilet humor (both figuratively and literally) but it does have a few jokes (pop-culture references) where you may smile or chuckle however, it is not enough to save it.

Honestly, Stalled has no redeeming qualities. If, for some reason, you are interested in low budget, "indie" film with zombies, I do not recommend Stalled.

Stalled: I liked it

[Platypuschow · 7/10 · 27 December 2023]

Plot

A janitor gets trapped in a women's restroom and encounters an all-out attack by a horde of zombies.

Cast

Unfamiliar with anyone involved

Verdict

I don't know why but I was quite excited after reading the premise many years ago when it got added to my watchlist. It must be 6-7 years since that day and I've only just got round to it.

Now I'm a big zombie fan, without question it's my favorite sub-genre and I think zombies and comedy have a history of going hand in hand very well so my expectations were quite high going in.

The first thing I noticed was how good some of the writing was. Slightly marred by some oddly crass stuff a lot of the dialogue is surprisingly good, quite deep in fact in a couple of places and I didn't expect that.

The humor? Some stuff really hit the mark and was laugh out loud.

Our leading man, solid.

The zombies, passable.

The execution, better than you'd assume.

Sure it's on a very limited budget but it disguises this well and delivers an oddly enjoyable zombie comedy jaunt.

Rants

Me and the missus always have a show ongoing, something to binge and we've just started The Walking Dead. I was so excited initially when it came out but then bailed at the end of Season 2 as to me it wasn't the zombie epic I expected and simply a soap opera with zombies. I'm hoping I was wrong, I'm hoping this second chance and subsequent 9 seasons beyond what I've seen improve.

Zombies are great, Stalled demonstrates that but as Walking Dead has so far demonstrated they can also be a terrible bore.

Breakdown

Unique setting Great writing Well made Needlessly crass in places.

A worthy successor to Shaun of the Dead? No.

[Harry_Henderson_NZ · 2/10 · 8 November 2013]

The first thing that should worry you about this film before even watching it are the words prominently displayed on it's poster stating that it is "A worthy successor to Shaun of the Dead". After watching the movie I decided to go and read the full review where that little excerpt was taken from, just to make sure that the words 'This is not' didn't come immediately before or after it, because this is not a worthy successor to Shaun of the Dead and a worthy successor to Shaun of the Dead this is not.

In 1989 a family flying from Venezuela to Brazil crashed in the dense forest of an unexplored part of the Amazon rain forest. The tribe that lived there had never seen TV or movies, never heard of horror or zombies, yet I would bet my first born child's soul that with the home video camera that the tribe found in the wreckage, they would manage to make a better horror/comedy zombie film than what the makers of Stalled delivered to us.

First things first, Stalled is about a janitor working in a large office block who sneaks into the ladies restroom to quickly use one of the toilets, while in there the zombie apocalypse happens and he get's trapped. They should of made a movie about a person trapped in the toilets with a TV playing this movie and no way to turn it off, at least that would be true horror.

There are 3 main problems with this movie, firstly the camera-work is just horrible. Close ups and weird angles that are obviously meant to make the movie look interesting do nothing except make the movie look like a bunch of film students were given a camera with no teacher around to tell them when they were doing things wrong. Also it just looks cheap, it doesn't have that movie feel to it, it looks more like a half decent home made video posted on Youtube.

The 2nd problem is the acting, especially by the actor playing the main character. He is the writer of this movie and unfortunately for us he decided to play the lead role as well, a lead role where the character is the only character on screen for 95% of the movie. He can not act. I could give any of you reading this a copy of the script, on the day it was to be filmed, and I would expect that all of you could deliver your lines better than he could. I will be surprised if his acting career in the future entails anything more exciting than dressing up in a giant animal suit and playing Roger the giant Rabbit in a pantomime for preschoolers, even then he wouldn't be first choice for any director. But acting in a horror comedy film isn't that important, not when you have a witty script filled with humorous and/or dangerous situations for our characters to find themselves in........

...and that brings us to the last, and possibly the biggest problem with this comedy horror film. It just doesn't successfully deliver on the horror or the comedy. The comedy is school boyish at best, not what we have become used to from British films over the last few years. The first "funny" scene in the film is when the janitor, stuck in a stall in the ladies toilets, contemplates masturbating to two scantily clad women who walked in and decided to start making out with each other for no real reason after they had been talking about what men they liked. At least I think it was meant to be funny, either that or it was meant to be disturbing, if it was meant to be disturbing then the filmmakers succeeded. The comedy goes downhill after that with jokes and gags that just don't work. The horror on the other hand is non existent, it doesn't miss like the comedy does, it just isn't there, sure there are zombies and we see people get eaten, but there is no tension, no sense of claustrophobia (which is quite an achievement for a movie set inside a toilet cubicle),no panic, no urgency and absolutely zero fear shown by the leads. I can think of pretty much any horror comedy movie and all of them had more horror in them than this did, even the Scary Movie franchise, and for a movie that is meant to be a horror comedy but isn't funny and has no scares, that's a problem.

I'll leave now, I will admit that this movie left me thinking about it long after I had finished watching it, and that thought was "Is it irony that this movie is set entirely in a toilet and turned out to be a big steaming pile of sh...........?"

I give it 2 stars out of 10. One for the camera operator managing to keep the camera pointed in the right direction and another for the brilliant portrayal of a toilet played by a very talented toilet.

great premise....

[Sorpse · 7/10 · 3 December 2013]

This was a very competent film. The premise was incredible but it definitely worried me into wondering how they could pull it off. A guy surviving the zombie apocalypse from a bathroom stall. Funny, but could it fill a feature? In the end I would say that they pulled it off. The script went at a good pace, the zombies and gore looked good, and probably the best part was the lead actor who pulled off his role very well. The only problem that I would have with this movie though is that there wasn't anything that really put it over the top for me too make it overly memorable, besides the original premise of course. It satisfied but it didn't quite thrill me so for that it gets a 6.5. Its a movie that achieves what it set out to do and for that its a success in a genre (low budget independent zom-com) that can be very tricky to tackle.

Low end vanity film, and the low end of the zombie genre.

[suite92 · 1/10 · 27 November 2013]

Christmas Eve, somewhere in the UK. There's a corporate party. There's also a complaint about a smell in the ladies' rest room. Our hero, WC, extracts the dead rat causing the smell from the ceiling fan vent. Two women in skimpy costumes come in, so WC hides in a stall on top of a stool.

One of the women turns zombie, then bites the other. WC drops his cell phone into the toilet, which fries it. Then the first two zombies go after WC. He kills the first., then the second. More zombies come in. Soon enough, WC is trapped in the loo. More zombies come to the toilet. Fortunately for WC, they are, by and large, slow zombies.

He gets another cell phone from a zombie, then calls the police. Unfortunately, he does this at the moment of conversion. Evie is in the second stall over, and she has also not converted. Jeff from IT shows up, strong and not infected, but WC unintentionally infects him. Their chances grow slimmer.

Evie and WC talk from 33 minutes until 41 minutes. That inspired zero laughs, rather like the movie as a whole. WC gets his ladder, and makes an attempt to get his tool box. He get the toolbox, but loses the ladder. The conversation resumes, only on a more ribald note. Evie throws him a pill, and he makes the awful mistake of taking it; he has not experience with drugs, so he's screwed.

While drugged, WC just walks out of his stall and the zombies take him where he wants to go. Sure. Then Evie finally makes contact, and the false memories fade.

Some truths come out. The management had fired him. On the way out, he stole some fund for a 'good cause' whatever that was. He also stole Evie's cell phone, that is, the one he dropped down the toilet.

By another happy circumstance, he gets his hammer for a while, only to get his hand grabbed and bloodied...or so he thought. He needs to get swinging with the hammer. He does get to a crawl space that might get them out, or not. Evie turns out to be really large, and likely won't fit. She sacrifices herself to give him more of a chance.

He follows a crawl space to another vent, but only zombies are in the connecting room. He tries other rooms. Finally, he wraps himself in toilet paper and breaks through the zombies. He meets the real Evie, and she seems OK, except she got lacerated by one of the zombies.

Will he make it out alive, talk to his mum, have a Happy Christmas?

----Scores-----

Cinematography: 6/10 Poor. Has sort of a VHS feel to it: low contrast, washed out, sometimes grainy.

Sound: 6/10 Hollow. Has that bad VHS hollowness. I wonder what equipment they used to record such bad sound.

Acting: 1/10 There is only Dan Palmer, and he is not worth anything.

Screenplay: 1/10 Nonsense. Perhaps 15 minutes of plot spread over 82 minutes. The zombies are not funny, WC and Evie (actually Heather) are not funny, the drug nonsense is beyond stupid. The zombies are a threat, then they are not, then they are. It is totally inconsistent.

I need a toilet

[nogodnomasters · 8/10 · 8 April 2018]

During the company Christmas Party WC (Dan Palmer) is doing repairs in the ladies room. He ends up in a stall as he watches two women go from lovers to one eating the other. Zombies congregate in the same ladies room as WC fortifies his stall and plans his escape.

The film is consumed with dialog between WC and Heather (Antonia Bernath) in another stall. When the dialog was great, the film was good. Unfortunately the conversation needed to be shortened and more time spent on zombie action. The comedy is front loaded.

An enjoyable zombie film that won't please everyone.

Parental Guide: F-bomb. Brief beginning F/F action, brief nudity.

Nice little zombie film

[bowmanblue · 7/10 · 19 September 2014]

Okay, so, if you haven't got much of a budget and you want to make a picture, where do you set it? The answer: a toilet. I had to watch this film to believe it – an entire (zombie) film set inside a toilet (and, most importantly, a toilet cubicle). But, amazingly, they pulled it off – just.

At a Christmas party the dead rise (why... who cares!) and a janitor gets trapped in the women's toilets by a horde of flesh-eating ghouls. There he must sit and wait it out, or try to escape (or maybe both). Apart from the zombies (who don't really talk, as you can imagine), this is pretty much a one man show, as the janitor does what we might do in such a situation – which is pretty much nothing, as the circumstances don't really allow it.

And the janitor does a pretty good job of holding the film together. But he's not alone. There's someone else in the other cubicle, but we never really see her. All we get is her voice and they speak through the wood throughout the film. Unfortunately, I felt this 'mystery' character was the film's sticking point. I don't know why, but I never really believed there was anyone in the other stall. It was like she had recorded her lines in a separate studio and the production team were just playing them at the appropriate times.

There isn't that much gore (as the budget probably wouldn't allow it), but there is enough humour to keep most 'zom-com' fans would like (and even a few quite touching moments here and there). It's no Shaun of the Dead, but it's not a bad entry into the increasingly saturated zombie genre.

Needs Something

[gavin6942 · 5/10 · 6 December 2013]

A janitor (Dan Palmer) gets trapped in a women's restroom and encounters an all-out attack by a horde of zombies.

Clearly the people who made this have talent, had an idea, had a good cast and crew and had a sense of humor. But it just never really took off. There are some scenes that are pretty awesome, but the vast bulk of the time is drawn out (I could not care less about the relationship between WC and the girl in the other stall).

Unfortunately, another issue was the strong British accents. I cannot hold this against them -- or at least I should not -- but many of the talking parts were completely lost on me. These were some thick accents.

Dreadful

[film_fan1991 · 3/10 · 30 March 2014]

This film is the biggest pile of crap. it makes no sense the lines of comedy (well i say comedy) aren't even funny and the one set they have used is stupid if i was you i would rather stick pins in my eyes than watch this film again!!

The film is basically a badly done rip off of Shaun of the dead it starts with a janitor who is fixing the hand dryer in the ladies toilet then two girls come in and start kissing the one of them bites the other then more zombies come in from a Christmas party no explanation of where it started or anything. in review i only gave it a three out of ten because they used a few good special fx during the film otherwise i would have given it a 1/10

Don't do it

[dmitri-giovanni · 1/10 · 10 November 2013]

First off let me say I did not finish the movie. I am the curious type, yet I am in no way even thinking about watching this movie again. There is no way that it could revive itself, any entertainment value dies off quickly and is buried by horrible acting. Don't waste your time, this is not a ploy. Don't think, "If it is that bad I have to watch it." NO!!! It is worse than that, worse than you can imagine. I do not know how it has 5 stars. there really isn't anything else that I need to say, but IMDb makes me write 10 lines. If curiosity just takes over and you must experience it for yourself, don't bother with the whole movie (I almost typed film, which it isn't). Watch just enough to know just how horrible it is, then tell all your friends. The only enjoyment this movie brought to my life was trying to explain how incredibly awful it was to someone else...

The ultimate in toilet humour

[Leofwine_draca · 3/10 · 11 June 2016]

STALLED is a dumb, low budget British comedy horror about a guy who ends up trapped in a toilet cubicle during the zombie apocalypse. It's a film which prides itself on its humour and tries to be the new SHAUN OF THE DEAD, although sadly the calibre of the humour is more like the woeful LESBIAN VAMPIRE KILLERS.

I don't have a problem with low budget films, and the idea of a single location film like this is quite appealing. So it's a pity that the premise is wasted on poor, over the top acting and dumb jokes throughout. The silly zombies are played for laughs and there are the usual gross-out gore gags and the like which are also played for supposed humour.

I suppose it should come as no surprise that most of the humour here is of the toilet variety. One of the worst things about this is non-actor Dan Palmer who really struggles to sustain the viewer's interest from beginning to end. Perhaps with a more talented actor this would have been more watchable. But the attempts at suspense are woeful and certain plot developments - like the twist involving the girl in the women's toilet - are quite offensively stupid.

I mean, I enjoyed it...

[clarka3-145-478444 · 6/10 · 20 January 2019]

I think we all know by now that every low budget zombie movie isn't going to hit the right spot for every zombie fan.

I enjoyed the use of confined spaces and tension/comedy though. Worth a watch unless you're the zombie fan that craves action in their movies.

Dan Palmer is no Simon Pegg

[SnoopyStyle · 5/10 · 12 December 2013]

A janitor is fixing the fan in the ladies room when people starts to turn. At first, he's a perv peeping on a couple of hot chicks. Then, the girls go zombie and he's hit by a wave of company Christmas party goers turn zombies.

This is a low budget British zombie comedy. The blood and gore hold very little scary moments. I actually like the charm of a low budget horror, but the only scary thing is that oversized stuff rat. As for the comedy part, it had a couple of smile worthy moments. Certainly, there is nothing worthy of a big laugh. The lead character WC is a loser weasel. But Dan Palmer is no Simon Pegg. He doesn't have the likability of Pegg. He's a pale imitation. For a low budget movie, it had its moments. There's just not enough moments to recommend the movie.

Generally enjoyable zombie comedy with a few minor issues

[kannibalcorpsegrinder · 7/10 · 29 March 2020]

Entering a woman's bathroom facility, a janitor in a high-rise building enters a woman's bathroom for regular janitorial services only to get trapped inside when a zombie outbreak occurs and traps him inside, forcing him and another trapped co-worker to try to escape the situation.

This was a decent enough zombie comedy. Among it's best aspects here is the rather strong and enjoyable setup that immediately drops us into the main scenario. It's incredibly quick into this one that he becomes trapped inside the stall witnessing the attempted lesbians turn on each other when the zombie attacks the other one and keeps him inside. This results in the film exploring the possibility of its premise where he tries to find ways of getting out of the room where they get interrupted by the new zombies getting into the bathroom. The continuous influences to keep them out results in plenty of enjoyable and fun action here, from trying to sound an alarm to alert authorities to grabbing weapons from inside the room to use against them and finally the full-on action of the escape attempts to get out of the bathroom which are all due to the film's desire to keep the zombies as threats throughout which is greatly appreciated. That also leads to the film's comedic atmosphere and attitude. The fact that so much of this one is carried along through the hapless lead, focusing on the down-on-his-luck career guy with no prospects or positive outlook on life who keeps getting himself into deeper trouble creates plenty of laughs as his lack of smoothness or grace generates tons of fun. Mixing his lacking heroic qualities with genuine physical comedy, such as using severed fingers and a bra as a slingshot, continually using his reflection in a mirror on the other side of the room as a distraction to complete tasks or coming up with toilet paper as body armor to protect himself while wading through hordes of creatures offers up that fine combination of inverting his expected heroism with fine physical comedy as these come about due to needing to protect himself from previous screw-ups. On the whole, these here are what works here. This one does have some minor flaws here. The main flaw here is the absolutely flimsy and barely worthwhile storyline in keeping the film going as long as it does. There's very little at work here requiring this to be stretched out with the two figures in the single location as a feature-length film, requiring him to be completely inept at everything to further the story. None of that is realistic or believable, causing the film to get to a respectable running time by utilizing its secondary flaw in mind-numbing conversations between them. Zooming into a sketch on the wall for her face instead of switching to being in her stall serves to highlight the twist from the very start, and as none of it's hounding or him or dirty stories all that funny making it appear as padding to stretch its premise out. These are pretty much the only areas holding this down.

Rated Unrated/R: Graphic Violence, Graphic Language and Brief Nudity.

More sexist than Michael Bay

[dave-409-200900 · 1/10 · 21 October 2014]

I got this film on DVD late at night thinking it would be a fun knock off of Shaun of the Dead. Even the cover suggests it. But it is not. It is a terrible movie from the first frame. Maybe when they shot it there wasn't enough light so they had to compensate during the editing, or maybe they were going for a contrastless, desaturated look but didn't know how to do it. I don't know. But it's just painful to look at.

I watched Transformers: Dark of the Moon the same day as this and I thought that was misogynistic. It is, but it's nothing compared to this. It's less than 5 mins into the film where two minor female characters in skimpy clothing are kissing each other for the very smallest of plot reasons. This film hates women and puts them into two boring tropes. 1. They are thin and shallow. 2. They are fat.

That said, don't get the impression that the male characters are well written. They are barely written. It feels like a film school script where sometimes A leads to B which leads to C in an unemotional, functional way and other times it just gets lost.

The screenwriter decided that he was the best person for the main role of this film. It's interesting to see him struggle to deliver lines that he wrote. I think putting the dialogue into a speech simulation program would lead to a better performance.

A terrible, terrible movie with nothing going for it. The comedy is slow and painful, the gore is boring, the plot is full of holes and is so shallow it's not even enough to fill the 75 minute run time. Do not watch. Not even on a bad film night.

An hilarious and heartfelt horror comedy

[May_lo · 10/10 · 6 November 2013]

Stalled was a real surprise. A zombie picture that takes place in a restroom? Sure to be full of puerile urine jokes, yes? No. The surprise element came in the form of emotional u-turns (u-bends?), well drawn characterizations and unique performances. The majority of the reviews for this film have been great, the bad ones seem to be on IMDb and are so bitter it is clear that the individuals writing them have more of a deepseated problem with themselves than any film!

This film is equally silly, emotional and action packed and the makers (for the most part)stay true to their all-in-a-stall concept. I saw this with a festival crowd and the entire audience cheered and laughed and whooped throughout. So inventive I squealed. Give it a chance - you won't regret it.

Flush of the Dead.

[morrison-dylan-fan · 6/10 · 14 August 2018]

Talking to a friend over what she has been up to over the summer, she mentioned about catching up with books/DVDs,due to her laptop playing up in loading up Netflix. Arranging to meet up,I got asked to bring a Horror flick along. Recently picking this up after reading Kim Newman's review in Empire,this looked like a good moment to install this film.

View on the film:

Keeping most of the action blocked in the toilets, director Christian James & cinematographer Sashi Kissoon flush potential boredom away from the limited location by focusing on the claustrophobia,eyed up as W.C looks through the gap in the door,and wide-shots showing the gents stuffed with zombies. Wetting the floor of the loo with wonderful oozing sounds, James has the movie overflowing with Horror Comedy Splatter,where every attempt W.C. makes to escape is met with zombie moans and buckets of blood jamming his way.

Drained at a trim 72 minutes, (and 10 mins of credits!) writer/star Dan Palmer dishes up a one-man play, (with Antonia Bernath being an unseen voice in another cubical) of cute lo-fi comedy, running over W.C useless handyman grasping anything at hand to beat the apocalypse. Locked in a toilet for most of the flick, Palmer does not shy away from showing the mean, sarcastic side of W.C. After doing well delivering character-based laughs and gory jolts, the makers dent everything with a sudden, ill-fitting ending,which leaves the film stalling.

High concept, low quality.

[BA_Harrison · 3/10 · 8 October 2016]

In British comedy/horror Stalled, a janitor (Dan Palmer) finds himself trapped in a ladies toilet cubicle during a zombie outbreak; unfortunately, this fairly neat concept is flushed away by a lousy script that fails to deliver either the laughs or scares, while wooden performances push any potential even further round the U-bend.

The film takes place on Christmas Eve as W.C.—as the janitor is appropriately named—prepares to leave his job for good, having helped himself to the charity money raised by office employees during their seasonal work do. However, before W.C. can abscond with the cash, the living dead block his way, forcing him to reconsider his plans.

After a while, W.C. becomes aware of another survivor, a woman, also trapped in one of the cubicles; what follows is lots of desperately unfunny dialogue between the two, the nadir of which is a 'charming' tale of incest, interspersed with uninspired zombie action (which at least provides some cheapo splat-stick gore, I suppose).

Quite Cute - Give it a Chance

[bizzywiththefizzy · 3/10 · 9 November 2017]

Another one on Horror Channel in the wee hours.

It's very cheap, and the first few minutes went a bit soft-porny, but it was more entertaining than some bigger budget US horror of late.

The 'hero' is likable enough (aside from being a perve) and I dug that he's the world weary, a bit dumb, loser type - a la Shaun.

I did find myself rooting for him, and the voice of the girl trapped in another stall was a clever touch. That said, I did spend most of my time wondering if she was a figment induced by stress up until she chucks him an E. On that subject, the 'rave' sequence was very sweet and reminded me of Tyres from 'Spaced' who bursts into dance at traffic lights and any other repetitive noise. I wonder if that was a wee nod to Simon Pegg?

The ending was a giggle (but the post credit sequence was pointless and irritating) and overall, it's good for a pretty much zero budget piece. Also, having worked in big offices full of dreadful people, it sums up the nightmare of Christmas work parties.

Rest (in peace) room zombies

[one9eighty · 5/10 · 30 November 2020]

Directed by Christian James and with a runtime of 84 minutes, this 2013 British zombie comedy horror film mostly takes place in the stall of a women's toilet cubicle - hence the name "Stalled". It is fair to say that this is toilet humour as it is written by and stars Dan Palmer, who goes by the name W.C. in the film (the name being the toilet humour part in case you though I was suggesting that Dan Palmer is $h1t).

At a Christmas party, things start going wrong. Partygoers are turning into flesh hungry zombies. Meanwhile a janitor, W.C. is stuck in the lady's bathroom and fighting for his life - or surviving at least anyway. There are a series of flashbacks which set the characters up, and there are some monologues to explain how feelings are being handled. There is a bit of gore as you would expect, but never too much to make the film a full-blown splatter horror film. Some of the comedy is ok, but there are a lot of cultural references which only relate to the time the film was made rather than being an all-spanning and encompassing reference point. W.C. is not entirely alone, as there is another person stuck in the room too, but she is a voice only and is never really seen. The addition of a second voice helps to make the film a little more than just one man's isolation in the situation which might have become tedious extremely fast.

Unashamedly a low budget film (£45k) with a nice concept, but it never really takes off fully and left me wanting something more to happen. I like that there was a confined element to the film and this helped the theme, but by the end of it the concept had worn down on me a little bit - the dialogue only entertained me for so long. I guess if you strip back something like "Night of the Living Dead" or "Shaun of the Dead" to a single room, with a single character, add some modern humour, this is what you get. Dan Palmer carries his creation on both shoulders and does not embarrass himself, but the film is as limited as location it uses. This is never going to be an all-time memorable zombie film, but it is a nice enough situational film which zombie fans will want to watch just for the sheer hell of it.