Most Helpful Customer Reviews
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25 of 29 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Overnight accommodations, complete with evil spirits and gooey entrails!, October 16, 2005
After finding this film on sale at a local DVD store, and reading the cover which proclaims that "Dead and Breakfast" is the US answer to "Shaun of the Dead," I had to pick this up for myself. I hadn't heard anything else about this film at the time, but being a huge fan of "Shaun of the Dead," and cheesy horror flicks in general, I bought it on a whim. While the aforementioned statement might be slightly misguided, "Dead and Breakfast" is certainly worth a viewing or two.
While on the way to a friend's wedding, six youngsters carpooling in an RV end up deciding to stop the night at a small town bed-and-breakfast. This bothered me right off the bat. They're in an RV, why stop and rent rooms? Nonetheless, they stop to sleep for the night in Lovelock. By morning, the two locals working the property are dead, and the six renters find themselves at the top of the suspect list and unable to leave to attend their friend's wedding. A mystery regarding the inn's owner and his son's untimely death gradually unravels. An evil spirit inhabiting a box within the inn has been unleashed and now resides in the body of Johnny (Oz Perkins), one of the band of six.
The body count mounts as Johnny converts more and more souls to his cause of death, destruction, and mayhem, leaving the remaining five friends and a few other of Lovelock's stragglers fighting for their lives. They batten down the hatches and pick off as many possessed as they can from the confines of the inn, a la "Night of the Living Dead," making weapons out of whatever they can get their hands on. In the meantime an all-knowing drifter (Brent David Fraser), the sheriff (Jeffrey Dean Morgan), and Melody (Gina Philips) are seeking to get to the heart of the matter by visiting Lovelock's cemetery.
This film has lots to offer to the light-hearted and uncritical horror/slapstick fan. The gore is unsurpassed, and the laughs never let up. The acting is pretty darn good in comparison to other films of this genre. Furthermore, there is a Greek-style chorus (Zach Selwyn as Randall Keith Randall, a gas station attendant) singing rhyming country interludes throughout the films entirety, which, though odd at first, is a hilarious addition to the movie. Nods to previous horror films abound, and any genre aficionado should be able to appreciate that.
Dead and Breakfast may never be up for any fancy awards, it may be a little thin on plot, and may not be, in my opinion, as good as "Shaun of the Dead," but it is still great fun for anyone who can appreciate a jovial romp through puddles of oozing viscera.
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16 of 19 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Slapstick gorefest that never takes itself seriously, September 6, 2005
The cast alone makes this movie worth seeing--there's barely a face you won't recognize--Portia de Rossi, John Carradine, the guy from Drew Carey, billy from Six Feet under and Wrong Turn, the girl from the first jeepers Creepers. As for the movie itself, in the first half hour or so, I thought it was a bit too slapstick, but you really have to go with it, because that's exactly what it is--an all out comedy. It's not even so much a "parody" of other horror movies as it is a horror premise that has non-stop humor. Sure, you can see some of the horror nods--Evil Dead 2, Carrie, Creepshow with its comic book still shots--but this movie is totally over the top. Think the airplane movies with a horror theme and buckets o' blood. The entire movie is scored with a sort of hillbilly group and a singer who is basically the narrator of the movie, and he steals the show with his campy lyrics and expressive faces. And, if you get the unrated version, do expect a whole lot of cheesy blood and gore. This one is definitely one I could watch again and again, particularly with groups of friends.
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4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
A weird mix of horror, comedy and one rapping, country zombie-singer, February 19, 2006
Dead and Breakfast has to be one of the most off-the-wall, oddball, horror-comedy splatterfest I've seen in quite awhile. The only thing I can think of to compare to would be Peter Jackson's Dead Alive. Some think this also has a feel of Raimi's Evil Dead II, but even Raimi's splatterflick had genuinely scary moments to balance the comedy.
I first read about Dead and Breakfast from Aint-It-Cool-News. I read that it was suppose to be some sort of zombie comedy and America's answer to the excellent British romzomcom (romantic, zombie, comedy) Shaun of the Dead. Well, that was all I needed to hear. I bought the dvd once it was out for sale and I have to say that it got the comedy part right and somewhat the zombie part. The zombie's are more like spirit-possessed people. I saw no gutmunching and limbs being ripped off unless it was the zombies themselves being hacked and chopped to pieces. Dead and Breakfast didn't skimp on the gore and splatter gags. And for a low-budget film most of the gags and gore-effects were pretty well done. But outside of the gore and blood there really wasn't anything scary about the movie to help balance the over-the-top comedy side of things. When I say over-the-top I mean it. There's a whole sequence of zombies busting out into a country line dance number all the tune of a trio of a rap-country zombie band doing a set on-top of an RV. I must say that this movie is weirdly funny.
The acting is typical of most low-budget horror flicks. Though I'm surprised that the quality isn't abit higher with a few young actors who have done better work such as Gina Phillips, Jeremy Sisto, Erik Palladino and David Carradine. I think the actors couldn't decide whether they should act just funny enough and serious when it came to be serious or just be over-the-top. I think if they all just went overboard with their performance it would've added more to this film. If I had to pick a stand-out performance then I'd have to say Erik Palladino's character of the boorish David would fit the bill. He seemed to know that the dialogue wasn't meant to be taken seriously and any of the scenes. He seemed to be one who was having the most fun on the screen.
In the end, Dead and Breakfast is one of those movies that will be seen as a cult hit on the midnight circuit. It'll do well for those Mystery Science Theater 3000-type of movie nights where people watch and add their witty comments with much beer to be had. I really think alcohol consumption would make watching this film a more enjoyable endeavor. There's not much scares to be had for a horror movie, but it sure has a belly-load of laughs, gags, and bloody slapstick.
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