by Dan Tabor
Cinapse Pick of the Week
Exactly what it sounds like, the Pick of the Week column is written up by the Cinapse team on rotation, focusing on films that are past the marketing cycle of either their theatrical release or their home video release. So maybe the pick of the week will be only a couple of years old. Or maybe it’ll be a silent film, cult classic, or forgotten gem. Cinapse is all about thoughtfully advocating film, new and old, and celebrating what we love no matter how marketable that may be. So join us as we share about what we’re discovering, and hopefully you’ll find some new films for your watch list, or some new validation that others out there love what you love too! Engage with us in the comments or on Twitter or Facebook! And now, our Cinapse Pick Of The Week…
With Ip Man 3 FINALLY hitting theaters I thought I would pick one of my favorite films by co-director Wilson Yip the highly underrated Bio Zombie as my pick of the week.
Bio Zombie is a 1998 Hong Kong horror comedy that riffs heavily off of George Romero’s Dawn of the Dead and even a bit off Peter Jackson’s Braindead. The film takes place in a mall where two wannabe criminals Woody Invincible (Jordan Chan) and Crazy Bee (Sam Lee) run a bootleg VCD shop and spend their days harassing their customers and playing House of the Dead. When they’re tasked with picking up the boss’ car they accidentally run over a businessman who just happened to have purchased an Iraqi bio weapon disguised as a soft drink (Fun Fact: It’s actually Lucozade IRL). When the wounded man tries to warn the two about the weapon, they figured he just wanted a drink and they force the man to drink it. They then stash him in the trunk to cover up the accident and return to work promptly forgetting about him.
After returning to the mall the man eventually escapes then infecting others as Woody and Crazy are joined in their fight for survival by their female counterparts who run the beauty store in the same mall Jelly and Rolls (Angela Tong). I seriously love these names. While the film keeps things light and fun in its first two acts its then suddenly morphs in the third act into a much more somber piece as we find out this wasn’t simply an isolated incident. Bio Zombie perfectly combines my love of bad Chinese romantic comedies with Asian horror in a way that is way better than you would probably expect given the premise, subject matter and budget.
This is probably thanks first off to an amazing cast who handle the material perfectly, they know when to play it straight and when to have fun and boy do they chew some of these moments up. The strange part is Woody and Crazy are not really good guys by any stretch of the imagination, we see them rob someone at knifepoint and we get the idea that Woody had planned to try to take advantage of a very drunk Rolls at one point, that is until the zombie apocalypse interrupts him. That coupled with a surprisingly compelling script and great direction really elevates what easily could have been a simply a bad Dawn of the Dead knockoff. Also that and the soft drink angles pretty hilarious.
For its time it was something really different, I mean of course it came at the same time as Versus, Wild Zero and Junk, but Bio Zombie brought something complete different to the table with its take on the undead. Wilson Yip got his start Making Category 3 films (essentially X-rated for sex or violence) and after his breakout on Bio Zombie transitioned more into action cinema with Bullets Over Summer and eventually SPL: Sha Po Lang in 2005 with Donnie Yen, which was a throw back to 80’s Hong Kong action cinema. They paired up for almost a film a year until the iconic Ip Man series was born with its newest incarnation just being released over the holidays.
Needless to say if you’re a Romero you should definitely check out Bio Zombie. The film is only currently available legitimately in the US thanks to Tokyo Shock’s non-anamorphic letterbox release from 2000 that goes for less than $10 on Amazon used. Watching it again the film still works, while the effects have shown their age a bit, they also work as a great call back to the DIY aesthetic of Night of the Living Dead. Bio Zombie is a lot of fun and will definitely surprise you with not only its competent story and directing but some of the most likable unlivable characters in a horror romantic comedy.
This isn’t Dan’s first POTW to feature crazy Asian zombie flick. Check out his review of Wild Zero!