You’d expect a title like SARS WARS: BANGKOK ZOMBIE CRISIS to be one crazy, messed-up flick. And this 2004 Thai horror-comedy is indeed, but a little more focus and a lot less of the “boiiiiing!” sound effects would have made it an awesome crazy, messed-up flick. As it is, it’s a decent time-waster with as many great moments as there are bad ones.

The box sells as it a SCARY MOVIE-type spoof of the films RESIDENT EVIL, KILL BILL and STAR WARS; this is entirely untrue. There are no direct references to those movies; this is a zom-com (I just coined that) that exists in its own little world. And that’s a world that opens with an excellent animated credit sequence of a swordsman slashing zombies in half. It sets the stage for a perfectly outrageous first 10 minutes complete with a guy in a bear costume and a tainted insect that makes Thailand’s record as Asia’s only virus-free nation moot.

The virus borne by the bug is referred to as “Sars No. 4″ in the subtitles, and it turns those infected into bloodthirsty zombies cast from the Romero mold. It quickly spreads throughout a high-rise apartment building, where kidnappers are holding a schoolgirl for ransom, an inept hero aims to save her, a super-hot foxy scientist tests out antidotes and runs around in her underwear, and a giant musical zombie snake roams the halls. Hell, there’s even a zombie baby (rendered in bad CGI), a disturbing tranny-sex subplot and a few anime sequences to push the nudity boundaries further than they could get past the censors in live-action.

I wanted to love this one. And there are enough great lines, surreal touches and non-sequitirs in its first chunk to suggest a rock-solid he-man viewing experience. But then the humor grows more cornball and too self-referential (i.e. “This movie must really want to make some cash!”). But just when think the crickets are about to chirp, it hits another homerun – like, dressing the lead villain in a CATS Broadway T-shirt. This cycle from inspired to insipid never ends in all of its 95 lunatic minutes. So while definitely watchable and entertaining, SARS WARS does fall short of the cult classic it so desperately wants to be.

An aside: Thai is the most unpleasant language to be absorbed by my ears this side of German. –Rod Lott

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This entry was posted on Saturday, August 19th, 2006 at 3:31 pm and is filed under DVD Reviews. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.