Granny of the Dead (2017) User Reviews

It had the spirit, but lacked the body...

[paul_haakonsen · 4/10 · 16 July 2017]

Right, well I am a huge fan of anything even remotely zombie in nature. And with a title such as "Granny of the Dead", I was intrigued, because it had the potential for being a good zombie comedy; at least it had the potential for it.

The storyline in "Granny of the Dead" was easy to follow, and doesn't really require much explaining. The elderly are dying and returning as animated corpses with a hunger for the living. A group of Young people are trying to live through the ordeal and remain alive and sane. Yeah, that was essentially it, simplistic for sure.

It felt like the movie was comprised of various scenes shot independently of one another and then put together in the editing room in order to make something reminiscent of a movie. It just didn't have a particularly coherent feel to it and it felt like continuity was a thing of the past.

Zombie movies should not, and I repeat, not have running and agile zombies. Having running zombies just adds a disruptive element to the atmosphere, and when dead, a body should not have the coordination and cognitive ability to sustain complex movement such as running.

As for the zombies in "Granny of the Dead", well I will say that there was a great number of zombies actually here, more than I had anticipated, so that was great. And the zombie make-up and special effects were actually quite nice. It is always a plus when a low budget zombie movie go beyond the usual error of just adding gray make-up and cheap theatrical blood to the face, but forgetting about the neck, hands and all other exposed areas of flesh. So thumbs up for the special effects team in this movie.

Now, I will say that the character gallery in the movie was broad. But I can't really claim to say that it was characters that you particularly took a liking to, or actually even bonded with on any level. The characters were just too mundane, generic and rather indistinct from one another. And it didn't really help that the dialogue was strained and forced; that didn't do much to make the character any more interesting.

When the zombie faces started to change from being dead elderly faces to what I assume was demonic faces, then I was about ready and done for. I was ready to call it quits and give up on the movie. But I decided to stick with it, since it was a zombie movie after all. But color me unimpressed.

It was rather difficult to get fully immersed into this movie, because it just felt forced and unnatural - well as unnatural as it gets with zombies.

"Granny of the Dead" was nowhere near as interesting or entertaining as I had hoped. And it turned out to be somewhat of a struggle to actually stick with the movie and not give into the desire of turning it off prematurely to find something more worthwhile to watch.

Granny of the Dead: Pitiful welsh nonsense

[Platypuschow · 2/10 · 23 August 2017]

I'm a huge zombie movie fan but my interest in the sub-genre is waning. The reason? Too many zombie films being released and far too many of them are dreadful. This welsh effort certainly comes under that category and is a failure on every front.

Unfunny comedy attempts, practically no storyline at all and so poorly made it could be confused for a student film.

The idea of the "Granny" zombies is short lived and quickly descends into yet another low budget zombie film with no identity and nothing to set it apart from the rest.

The Good:

Neat Jurassic Park reference

The Bad:

Those accents!

Terrible camera work

The premise isn't followed through with

Things I learnt from this movie:

I should avoid welsh cinema for a while

My Nan's a zombie and ate my cat

[nogodnomasters · 2/10 · 17 July 2017]

Old people in Wales are turning into zombies, something that may have something to do with the first church scene that was as poorly developed as the characters with cell phones growing out their ears. The rest of the film consists of young men dealing with their zombie grandparents while talking on a phone being filmed by someone who doesn't think a tripod is necessary for a decent film.

The film had its attempts at situational humor, nothing that reached my funny bone. The acting was bad and the zombie growls got real old at the end. The main take away was in case of a zombie apocalypse, stay put and supply up. That advice got old too.

Guide: F-word. No sex or nudity.

Lame Senseless Amateurish Garbage with Fake Reviews

[claudio_carvalho · 1/10 · 14 May 2018]

"Granny of the Dead" is a lame senseless amateurish garbage with fake reviews in IMDb. The plot does not make any sense and the cinematography and acting is terrible. The IMDb User Rating is overrated, maybe with the use of robots. Advice when most needed is least heeded, but stay away from this flick. My vote is one (awful).

Title (Brazil): Not Available

Funny Thing About the Positive Reviewers

[kim-sikorski · 1/10 · 16 July 2017]

Okay, the movie is terrible. That's a fact. Lets just let that fact sit there festering on the floor.

But this is weird..as mentioned by another reviewer, here's an interesting thing to do. Go look at the first reviews, the ones that rate this smoldering turd of a "movie" the same way I rated oh, say..the Godfather. Click on their names, and you'll see the other movies they've reviewed. It's so funny, all the people who gave this movie great reviews all reviewed the SAME MOVIES and reviewed them all the SAME WAY. It's uncannily eerie. I wonder if they all live in the same community a la the Stepford Wives, or even worse, if the pod people from Invasion of the Body Snatchers have landed. Yes, the pod people are here, and their mission is to get us all to publicly praise terrible movies on IMDb so we can be shamed by our friends and family.

Beware fake reviews, this film is garbage!AVOID!

[cooldougie · 1/10 · 14 July 2017]

All of the positive reviews of this film are by fake reviewers, all of whom have given positive reviews to the same handful of films and who registered at the same time!

The film itself is extremely poor, amateur acting, p@ss poor 'special' effects and crap attempts at humour.

AVOID AT ALL COSTS!

General Sense says,it's a trap.

[djangozelf-12351 · 1/10 · 14 July 2017]

I just did what this movie failed to do and that is using stolen dialogue but slightly changed it up and made it somewhat smart and funny.

I only watched the trailer for this and it felt cheap and extremely unoriginal. It feels like an awful rip-of from shaun of the dead with mixed in dialogue from the alien franchise.

This trailer also showed me a lot of red flags and it seems to be in every aspect of this movie. The acting looks bad,the direction,the writing and even the cinematography with the best effect being a flying golf ball?(don't ask!)

The zombie make up sort of looked okay but seemed pointless if given to bad actors who seem to be making funny faces.

The last nail is that...I did not laugh once,not even a chuckle.

So be smart ,watch the trailer before seeing the movie and if you still want to see it... your not me.

This feels like a copy of a copy...fake.

I hope I've saved somebody's wasted time on this by advising them to first see the trailer.

Thank you and enjoy!...something else.

Completely disappointing and dull zombie effort

[kannibalcorpsegrinder · 4/10 · 3 February 2018]

Hanging out in their small-town, a group of friends wakes up one morning to find the elderly residents in the area have become infected with a zombie virus that turns them into savage killers and must rally their group together to stave off the killer hordes before it overruns the town.

This was an overall disappointing effort. One of the few bright spots to be featured here is the fact that there's a nearly nonstop pace with this one essentially being all action from the start. The zombie threat is basically unleashed from the very beginning and doesn't let-up at all, giving this one a series of action scenes to keep itself fun in that regard as the need for battling the series of zombie attacks from the beginning is rather fun. There's numerous fun encounters out along the town as well as inside the house which showcase some rather fun moments trying to get the upper hand against the zombies as they continuously try to sneak into the house or chase them down in the streets around town, while the scenes of them out attacking other citizens that they see through the binoculars makes for a nice enhancement to these types of sequences. That these lead into rather fun gore effects with all the impalements and wounds being shown inflicted by the zombies makes these scenes all the more enjoyable due to the creative kills featured due to the nonstop battles. As well, the other big element is the rather nice-looking zombie makeup which alternates between the ravenous demon or bloodied distorted features. While these hold it up, there are a few problems with this one. Among it's biggest problems is that the tone shifts so rapidly throughout here it's at times impossible to know what type of film it wants to be. The setup here, with the wisecracking lead and the bizarre behavior he exhibits point to this one attempting to be a comedy of sorts which is completely against the serious tone exhibited by the attacks. None of the sequences are really that funny and it's such a disappointing affair that this can't capitalize on its setup as this one seems ripe for comedy as ideas like him trying to call his friends on the phone while they're trying to fend on an attacking being or seeing the police officers responding to the distress calls really could've been funny. Instead, they come off as completely dull and mishandled by the lackluster direction of the film much like the serious scenes which are also quite problematic. From shaking camera-work to out-of-focus moments and ludicrous action scenes of the zombies attempting to shuffle towards their victims, these here are laughably bad and really do a disservice to the film without a whole lot of enjoyable moments. This is also due to the central premise which is stretched out to absurd lengths in order to pad it's running time as there's a lot of unneeded moments added to enhance this one that includes extremely shoddy scenes of observing the situation from binoculars or just using lame slow-motion photography to make things go longer when it really shouldn't since the main storyline here is so flimsy. It also has the undesired secondary effect of making the action completely unremarkable and unworthwhile for the most part, rendering a lot of the encounters into a dull, dreary experience the robs this of a lot of the intended horror elements it could've had. The last big flaw here is no real reason for the apocalypse that's mentioned here from a supernatural to a virus and nothing really makes sense due to neither one really being explained. These here are what hold this one back.

Rated Unrated/R: Graphic Violence, Graphic Language and violence-against-animals.

Even the zombies look bored

[simonpcpearson · 2/10 · 9 September 2017]

This film is garbage.

The entire thing looks like it was shot on someone's mobile phone. The cast are universally bad and have impenetrable Welsh accents. I guarantee that most outside of the UK will find it impossible to understand what the characters are saying ( not that this is a loss. The script is dire and the acting abysmal).

No-one has a character ,or any charisma, is likable or attractive, not even the one whose outfit suggests that she is supposed to be the "hot" girl ( Sabrina Dickens).

The film isn't scary, funny or interesting. If you want find something to cure insomnia then Granny of The Dead might be it.

There is some amusement to be had from laughing at the incompetence of all involved but this will wear off long before the film is over.

OK if you're running low on zombie movies to watch

[virtuallann-1 · 4/10 · 18 July 2017]

I was expecting utter trash but was reasonably entertained throughout. By no means is this a good movie but if you are running low on zombie movies to watch and enjoy gambling your time on low budget fair it really isn't all that bad.

Effects are adequate, and the main character and SOME of the supporting cast do a passable job.

They did fail to adhere to some of the standard zombie ABC's though which was disappointing.

1. don't give away the origin

2. have 1 good zombie gutfest of someone being eaten alive

In general as long as you got those you've got a solid foundation.

Fresh zombie film!

[janepeterse · 11 July 2017]

Granny of the Dead follows a group of teens who wake up one morning to the surprise that the elderly in their town have turned into zombies! Fighting to stay alive, this outlandish humor of this spoof reminds me of Shaun of the Dead. This parody has the pop up scares, gore, and surprises you want to see in a scary movie. It also has the laughs, unique story line, and twists and turns you want to see in a parody. I loved the scary movie group of friends aspect as this film focused on each friend and what they were going through at their own home. The special effects were crazy and unlike anything I've ever seen! I loved this movie and I recommend it to any who wants to see a fresh take on a zombie movie.

The clues in the name

[neilcoatham · 10/10 · 19 October 2019]

To be fair to everyone giving it bad reviews the clue really is in the title of the film and for a very low budget independent film I quiet enjoyed it

Amusing in places

[rhhjones · 4/10 · 19 July 2017]

I suspect that viewers in South Wales will get a lot more out of this film than a general audience.

Some of the performances are quite OK and zombie make-up is occasionally pretty good, but the whole thing is very patchy.

The biggest problem is with the structure of the scenes and the editing. I think the director and editor were trying to create the feeling of frenzied panic, but at times it's just a bit too chaotic. Random face close-ups cutting to other random face close-ups. More establishing or medium shots would have made the whole thing "flow" more evenly.

As low budget zombie films go, though, this kept me entertained and amused.

Good effort. Some of the other reviewers should lighten up a bit. This ain't supposed to be Tarkovsky.

Unwatchable

[madelineangelahind-26972 · 1/10 · 9 August 2021]

Badly acted, badly shot, cheap pointless drivel. I can find little to praise in this sorry effort.

I am suspicious about the positive 10 out of 10 reviews.

Old and tired

[BandSAboutMovies · 2/10 · 21 January 2022]

Raig Tudor James directed, wrote, produced, edited, shot, did the effects and sound, as well as acted as Corey in this movie, a film in which a guy named Ed learns that his grandmother has gone on to her just reward only to come back as a shambling zombie who is gained power with each moment.

In fact, everyone old has become a zombie, which means that elderly care is about to change for all of us.

Sometimes, your zombie movie is Shaun of the Dead and sometimes, it's Hard Rock Zombies.

This one is, well, the latter. A funny idea that maybe will make a few laugh, but probably the weakest of the films on this set.

Had its couple of flaws - but a good indie film overall

[stevemccall-35648 · 5/10 · 7 September 2017]

The film had its couple of flaws, but as a regular visitor to Wales, I am one of those who can relate and "get" the humor behind it, and from that aspect I thoroughly enjoyed the script to a degree. Some reviews on here are pretty mean, and are kinda exaggerating, but they are forgetting this isn't a Hollywood film!

Anyway, my negatives on this film are: There wasn't much back story on the characters, and not much friendship development. Instead of separating them through the whole film until the very end, it would have been cooler to have them reunite sooner. Whether one bumped into another along the way during the film.

From an acting perspective, the only characters I couldn't relate to much was Dai and Gemma. But I loved Will and Charlie (Ricky Valentine and Tom Barker) who made me laugh in all their scenes "brainy brainy". And then there's Ceri (Sabrina Dickens), who was also enjoyable to watch. Her character is pretty bad ass and cute considering she is covered in blood and dirt throughout. She is also the serious character of the group, which broke down the humor of the film quite nicely.

Finally - The camera shakiness was a bit too much, and kinda ruined the film in parts, other than that, the zombies were pretty cool, good special effects, and a good laugh for a low budget film!

Hilarious and Thrilling Horror-Comedy

[kaylifsutl · 10 July 2017]

Granny of the Dead is a zombie-comedy that keeps you on the edge of your seat. This suspenseful film is full of surprises and I was truly impressed. The comedy was dry and reminiscent of British humor, which is right up my alley. Ed, your average guy, is being pursued by his grandmother- turned-zombie on a demonic rampage, and she's out for blood. I really enjoyed the visceral nature of the film and the front row seat I got of the action. If you loved movies like Scary Movie or Warm Bodies, you will love this film, or if you've been looking for a good movie to watch on a stormy night in, this is for you. Creative and satirical, this film reminds me of another classic, Sharknado, one of the best in the genre. An executive producer for this movie actually was the director of Sharknado. Entertaining and action-packed, this is the perfect movie to watch with a group of friends.

A Thrilling Horror & Comedy Film

[mabarry-69560 · 19 July 2017]

Granny of the Dead will fulfill your want for a movie that is both parts horror and comedy. The film takes you on a journey through a small Wales town that is under attack by zombies. The thrilling story follows a group of teens as they each uniquely try to fight and survive when zombies are around every corner. Granny of the Dead is a fresh take on our society's zombie phenomenon as you experience the supernatural story unfold with surprising twists and witty British humor. A movie created to entertain and keep us at the edge of our seats with seemingly real looking zombies by amazing special effects makeup and a lighthearted story of friends working together despite the life and death situation. The cinematography is visceral and creative that keeps you intrigued as you follow along with the story line. This is a must see for anyone who enjoys horror and comedy films as Granny of the Dead blends the genre together seamlessly for an entertaining experience.