The Dead Next Door movie review

Dead Next Door, The

By Jason Santo • Jan 31st, 2003 • Category: Horror, Reviews

The Dead Next Door doesn’t quite qualify as a Microcinema movie as it was executive produced by Sam Raimi and cost upwards of $125,000. Shot on Super 8mm in 1985-86, the movie didn’t get to post production until 1989 and was finally released in 1990. The fact that Bookwalter and company labored over this movie for years rather than producing it over one summer for $8,000 as originally planned reveals a lot about the difficulties low-budget producers face. It’s common for moviemakers shooting on film to spend at least $25,000 on a feature, and such a number would put them on the middle part of the Microcinema scale. But what if that moviemaker spent that much each year on one movie rather than several? This seems to be what happened to Bookwalter, who started production on the picture when he was only 18 years old.

So was it worth it? Aside from being a bit too close in tone and theme to George Romero’s militaristic zombie fest Day of the Dead, The Dead Next Door is an original, energetic and ambitious splatter movie that exudes a kind of roughed-edged charisma the likes of which you commonly see in Microcinema’s finest works. It’s all about the effort here, and despite missteps in plotting and acting, the movie is rather well made, its strongest moments being some terrifically original scenes of gory mayhem featuring a cast of hundreds. That’s quite a tall order for any movie, never mind one being directed by a kid and made on a low budget.

The story is pretty thin, pivoting around the efforts of a government-sponsored task force (cartoonishly named The Zombie Squad) to eliminate a zombie infestation started by, you guessed it, government scientists. Along the way, the members of this team are picked-off by denizens of the zombie menace while team leaders Raimi (played by Peter Ferry) and Kuller (Jolie Jackunas,) and the egotistical Dr. Moulsson (Bogden Pecic) clash with Reverend Jones, (Robert Kokai) an evangelist with an agenda of his own for the undead. The performances by the primary leads are fair enough, Ferry and Jackunas appropriately tough, but likable, and Kokai handles the jerk that is Reverend Jones with measured sliminess. But it is Pecic as Dr. Moulsson who steals the show as Dr. Moulsson. Crass, egocentric and sarcastic, Moulsson is the real villain of this piece, and you can’t wait to see his “I Once Thought I Was Wrong, But I Was Mistaken,” hat get ripped-off his head… or just see his head get ripped-off.

Also hanging around the periphery are a host of other not-as-seasoned actors and actresses pacing their way through various subplots, the most important of which involves Anna (Maria Markovic,) the “daughter” of Reverend Jones who has a mysterious relationship to the zombie epidemic’s creator, Dr. Bow (Lester Clark.) But really, it’s all about the action and the gore, much of which is playfully graphic and, though realistically rendered, never so vile as to upset casual viewers. Like the movie itself, the violence is of the “Look at what I can do” variety - a product of youthful exuberance.

The Dead Next Door is a strong representative for the very crowded field of Microcinema Horror flicks, even if it is a bit bigger than your usual release. It’s spectacle on a shoestring budget, and the ingenuity with which it was made will often have viewers wondering, “How did they do that?” rather than just, “How did they do that on a low budget?”

Four stars