Customer Reviews

Deadgirl (Unrated Director's Cut)

5 star:		(17)
4 star:		(27)
3 star:		(7)
2 star:		(6)
1 star:		(17)

 

 

Misfits Rickie and JT decide to skip school and drink beer in an abandoned insane asylum. After taking out their teen angst on the place, they incur the wrath of a guard dog. They narrowly escape it deep in the bowels of the building and find a room that's been sealed for a long time. In that room, they find something that will change their lives forever: a dead girl tied to a gurney and wrapped in plastic. They soon find out that she is alive, but extremely savage and seemingly immortal. JT wants to take advantage of having a nude, helpless female lying around, while Rickie feels quite the opposite. When word gets around and more people get involved, Rickie and JT embark in a power struggle that spins out of control and leads to an unexpected and dark resolution.

I just want to start by saying this is a very polarizing film: you'll either love it or despise it. The film as a whole is hard to watch because of the nonchalance the characters have with their own horrific actions. It's really chilling how calmly JT describes how he raped, beat, and attempted to kill the woman multiple times. He seems to think that it's ok because he sees her as being less than an animal. Zombies are usually the monsters in works of fiction, but in this case, it's the teenage boys that are infinitely more monstrous. Human nature can be an ugly and savage thing when out of the gaze of society.

These boys have discovered a world where they are the supreme rulers. They don't have to follow the rules or accept that they are pathetic losers who will contribute nothing to the real world. In this world, they always get the girl and call the shots. It's the ultimate fantasy for them. Their world is completely removed from reality, in a dark, dank basement that is the polar opposite of reality in almost every way. I hate the characters. They are pathetic excuses for human beings, but I can see where they come from: a place where no one cares what happens to them and where they have no future. It's a great character piece where I don't agree at all with them and I think they are horrible and stupid, but understand them just the same. That's the mark of great story telling.

Rickie is the only male character with any sort of promise. The others are satisfied to get sexual gratification from a mute, unaware woman than have a real, healthy, consensual relationship. Rickie still isn't completely innocent because he knows that what his friends are doing is wrong, but he hesitates to do something about it. He seems to be torn between resigning himself to the emotionless situation with the dead girl or attempting to make a real human connection with a living, breathing classmate. This film is kind of a sick and twisted coming of age story.

The woman being used and raped in this film is a zombie. This fact doesn't make her any less of a victim. Society in general objectifies women in the advertising and the media all the time. Women are frequently equated to objects or animals and shown as inherently inferior to men. Sometimes I find myself desensitized against such advertising because it's so pervasive and we as a society see literally thousands of advertisements each day. This general environment can make it easy for some to internalize this sexist thinking and go even further to say that anything can justifiably be done to them. The woman's rapists distance themselves from her by thinking of her as less than them, less than human. This film holds up a mirror to our society and makes us see the ugliness within it.

This is a powerful and uncomfortable film to watch. It's well produced, written, and acted. Jean Spain gives a wonderful performance as the Deadgirl and manages to make her both sympathetic and dangerous without even speaking. A lot of you probably wouldn't like this movie, but if you like dark films that deal with the horror within humanity then this is probably the movie for you.

Despite the few plotholes concerning the end of the film, this movie is a very different, very unsettling and a very well acted breath of fresh air to the horror genre. Jenny Spain puts on a remarkable performance in her silent role and the leads were very well cast. I just finished watching the film not 10 minutes ago and the final creepy frame of the movie is stuck in my head and I'm sure will do the same to anyone who sees it. If you're bored with today's watered down PG-13 crap that Hollywood calls "horror", check this film out.

It's a dark movie that is unlike any you've seen before, pushing over a previously untransgressed line-- immediately appealing to me. This is not a standard scare-flick with basic characters, but depicts how far young men will deviate from the norms of behavior when it comes to the object of their desire. This is a rewarding and highly memorable trip down a rabbit hole to a dark land of horror. The dead girl herself is a stunning presence, and the sound environment is unnerving. If you are into horror, dark fantasy, and taboo subjects, it's essential viewing. There's no over-explanation through obvious exposition, so there is an air of mystery and unknowing throughout the movie. It is like a surreal element dropped into high-school life that spreads a poison through it, though that poison comes from the minds of the boys, and the dead girl is just a catalyst, though a dangerous one! I'm looking forward to putting this in the DVD player for guests, unsuspecting or otherwise!

While watching DEADGIRL, I felt the same way I did the first time I watched RIVER'S EDGE. I got that same desolate, icy, sickening lump in my gut. Now, this had nothing to do w/ the title character, rather w/ the teen guys (lifelong friends, Ricky and JT) who stumble upon her. Much like RIVER'S EDGE, their combined attitude of arctic-cold indifference and excitement is what brings out the true horror. The fact that JT has already made up his mind as to what to do about / with the girl is disturbing in its matter-of-fact-ness. He is a pragmatist, only able to see the situation as an opportunity for himself. Ricky is the one w/ a conscience, but not enough courage to do what he knows he should. Together, along w/ the others they drag into it, Ricky and JT are the perfect pair of dominant psychopath and submissive patsy. Regardless of all the rest of the insane stuff that takes place after their initial encounter, nothing is as shocking as JT's agenda, or Ricky's inability to act. A fantastic tale of moral decline and madness...

Interesting expose' of juvenile male sex obsession. Given the opportunity presented to these high school males, I suspect at least ten percent would behave similarly. This served to make the movie that much more a horror and very interesting.

I was very pleasantly surprised with this movie. Its a little sick and twisted. The movie is well made and was interesting throughout. Also had a good ending. I might upgrade to the Blu-Ray when it comes out because I'll probably be showing this movie to my friends.

This was an awsome horror flick. Given it's name you'd think it was another run of the mill come back from the dead film. No...not at all this is a horror film where the roles are reveresed. The "zombie girl" in this film is the victim, and the people surrounding her are the true monsters to fear.

Most of the horror value in this film comes from watching the disturbing decisions being made by the boys that find her. Watching them torture the abandoned patient they find is what will have your gasping. Of course most of it is exagerated. You don't really see them do anything to her so it's pretty tasteful...calling the film raunchy or anything else is only to discredit this horror flick. This movie is more about morality than anything else.

A bunch of boys find themselves upon a naked girl chained to a bed and to top if off she has supermodel looks. They know no one is going to come looking for her...and it's obvious that she won't go anywhere... so what do they do?

Well.... that's what the movie is about. A group of boys who got the short end of the stick in life. They don't come from anything and have nothing going for them so they don't expect to go anywhere. They are the lower class and they have realized already that they won't be getting the cheerleaders or the girls they fantasize about... but there right infront of them is a beauty that is obtainable. So they take advantage of it... but such poor decisions always have their consequences.

Overall this was a great film...well worth adding to the collection.

As with "River's Edge" 23 years ago, youth's normal curiosity about death and sex is unhinged and rendered unspeakably perverse by a culture which is organized less by fixed principles than by unconscious, desire-based consumption. These observations employ a darker and more relevant conviction here.

The ideas at work in "Deadgirl" are so complex that calling this a "horror film" is perhaps not really accurate given the limitations by which the genre is judged. Admittedly, the film employs standard horror grammar, but by keeping an eye firmly fixed on economy and purpose, the directors avoid the pitfalls and cleverly make those limits work in their favor.

For example, the girl in question, while an "object" in strictly horror terms, is carefully crafted to be something other than a person - she functions as a perfect cipher onto which alternative meanings can be projected. Unlike typical "horror girls," she becomes as profoundly disturbing a concept as anything that contemporary horror has given us. She seems less an external creature than something within the characters. A fever dream of sexual, pathological-narcissism or trauma-porn-attachment made flesh. The context in which the story functions, an abandoned asylum is also rendered abstractly enough that one might read it equally as a metaphor or a place in the real world; an image of the rotting mind where deviance lurks - normally it's just a spooky ol' building when used in horror

The characters enter such a bottomless pit in terms of real human behavior that whether intentional or not, a sense of allegory provides grounding for the audience, while grounding is desperately missing in the world these characters occupy.

The film's male protagonists are are certainly of their time and they seem quite real to me. As with many kids today their sensitivities seem bleached away by what we all witness, a relentless, post-narrative media blast from earliest childhood and education without adequate social breadth. Their personal, familial inadequacies here seem to create a hunger for an effortless, narcissistic attachment. These are familiar kids. Placing them into this particular tale and intelligently imagining an outcome is what the directors have done. It is startling how effective it is.

While "Deadgirl"could easily have come across as a simply ghastly spectacle, the film transcends genre, as well as outflanking the need to simply entertain, shock or titillate. By its solid execution, its restraint and through the indigestible, dark brilliance of its idea, the film rises to the level of art.

Being a teenager and being bored - those two things seem to go hand-in-hand. For J.T. and his friend this means skipping school, thinking long and hard about the "where" that comes with drinking, and then deciding on an abandoned mental institution. At first this amounts to the destruction of property and demystifying the premises, but the afterward finds them exploring a little place called "the tunnel." In the tunnel the two find many things, but the most intriguing of all is a girl that is bound in chains and seemingly abandoned, all alone but still alive. Things get odder after one of the boys stays with her and decides to take out all his anger on her, breaking her neck in the process. The only problem is that this does not kill her - on the contrary, it starts a landslide that leaves everyone wondering where she came from, what she is doing here, and why she will not die.

While Dead Girl starts out slow and leaves a lot of questions unanswered, it does answer one key thing that makes me think that we all know the answers to what she is. When we first see the girl, she seems harmless enough. By the time some answers pour in and this façade is pulled away, however, she seems less like someone that was tormented and more like someone that you would chain in a basement because of a really good reason. That makes her scary and understandable at the same time, explaining how she was put into an institution and why she would be left behind, and it says a lot about the effort she put into making a character with no speeches or threats into something that changes its proverbial face. The actors do a good job of selling certain things about their characters as all of this is happening, too, making the movie one that is frightening and engaging all at the same time. The plot takes a few twists and turns as well, and the ending is one of those that really stayed with me.

Dead Girl has a lot of stuff in it that the movie does not discuss - it has nudity and violence and a lot of very disturbing notions. For this reason, some people may be turned off by the movie. Others may like the movie simply because the portrayal of the people is a real one in a lot of ways, showing the dark side of people and even the ugly side of caring. Personally, I liked it - even the slow parts - knowing how it all fit together. If you like a dark movie and have some time to check it out, I would say that it may be worth your time. Just don't let the editorial review or the cover review of the movie throw you - this is not a coming-of-age movie or some walk in the after-dark park.
If you can abide by that, then you should find yourself watching something you could really find interesting.

This is a definite must see film. Is it shocking? Well of course, that's the whole point of the movie. Is it disgustsing? Again, of course it is disgusting, but again, that is the point of the movie. Is it your standard gore-fest horror movie. No. That's why a lot of horror-movie fans do not like this movie. Why? Becasue it makes you think and most horror movie fans don't want to think about what's going on on the screen. Plus it hits too close to home for the many teen-age loosers who waste their time watching gory horror films. It is a look into the minds of a couple of typical teen-age, goofball slackers who find what they consider to be a god-send in the shape of a naked zombie girl strapped to a gurney. This is the best thing that has ever happened to the two total loosers who are the main characters. They don't care about the morals of the situation. They don't care about the girl. They don't even care that much about the sex. Its the concept of having this "treasure" that is important to them. A treasure that they can control and use and show off and generally do with what they want. For the first time in their miserable lives, these low-lifes are actually in control and they run with it. Conflicts arise with one of them has a crisis of conscience and thinks that maybe they should put a stop to the entire affair. The raping is a metaphor for their destructive approach to everything they do. They are a couple of lost-souls who make all the wrong decisions all the time. This film absolutely captures the essence of a looser and shows in brilliant detail just how twisted they can be. This film is similar in theme and approach to the Monica Belluci film "Irreversible" and is every bit as good.