User reviews

Shocker of shockers, this is a piece of crap. I know this news will startle many of you. How could this possibly go wrong, you say? A cheaply produced zombie flick with bad special effects and a cast of has-beens and never-weres? It has classic written all over it. Yet somehow this master formula fails. It would be easy for me to blame the movie's failure completely on the Hollywood Squares cast led by Mariel Hemingway (who, no joke, I thought was deceased) and the now-elderly and overweight Danny Trejo. But the cast is only a symptom of a much larger disease: namely The Asylum, the absolute worst production company in the industry today. Possibly worst ever. They make all that terrible SyFy channel garbage we all watch and hate. It's become popular in recent years to bestow some "so bad it's good" badge upon these movies. That's unfortunate because it just encourages more subpar waste like this is produced.

This movie sucks. Don't watch it.

The plot isn't anything new. And the execution is pretty typical.

Mariel Hemmingway's acting was outright painful. Flat line delivery, and almost never with the proper emotion. Ethan Suplee isn't much better, but thankfully he doesn't have to say much. Lavar Burton is excellent, think the emotion of I Am Legend, without the kick-ass survivalist skills. By far the most noteworthy part of the movie. Danny Trejo is as Danny Trejo is, bad-ass. You won't be disappointed by him.

The effects are decent and the gore is quality.

If you enjoy watching formulaic zombie action movies with little cinematic value, this will deliver.

From the very beginning of this movie I found myself wondering about the title of all things! "Rise Of The Zombies." It suggests that the movie is going to be about the beginnings of a zombie plague - how it happened, where it came from. But no. Actually, from the very opening scenes of the movie it seems pretty clear that the zombies have already risen! They're pretty much in control and there don't seem to be all that many survivors. Over the course of the hour and a half, we do find out that it probably started with an infected water system, and that it's pretty recent. One of the characters is pregnant, and she says she got pregnant at a party two months before. So, since people probably haven't been partying much since the zombie plague started, this whole thing must have happened in less than two months. But that's not the focus of the movie. Not at all. Those are just snippets of information that come out. So, yes, strange choice for a title.

With this being set in San Francisco (although the plague seems to be worldwide, or one assumes that there would be rescue missions) what survivors there are have holed themselves up on Alcatraz Island. So that's a bit of a twist: a high security prison becoming a sanctuary. Unfortunately, it seems that even Alcatraz isn't a very secure sanctuary. Every now and then zombies come wading ashore and have to be killed. Now, I've never looked it up, but I assume that the water depth between San Francisco and Alcatraz is more than 6 feet (ie, more than the height of your average human being - or zombie - or it wouldn't have been much of a prison) which suggests that since the zombies don't appear to be the type to enjoy boating they must be able to walk a fair distance under water. OK. Why not. It makes it harder to find a real place of refuge, thus increasing the hopelessness that's always at the centre of a zombie movie.

Aside from that little twist, though, there's not a lot of originality to this. The zombies are zombies. They're the undead, re-animated corpses controlled by a virus of some sort with a taste for the flesh and blood of living humans. Got it. Seen it many times.

The cast features a collection of fairly well known faces, although mega-stars they're not. People like Mariel Hemingway, LeVar Burton, French Stewart. They're all in this. A couple of others. Faces and names you know, in other words. Unfortunately, though many of the faces are familiar, the performances weren't great. Hemingway was probably the most front and centre as a scientist who takes a group from Alcatraz back into the city to try to find the lab where an antidote to the virus was being worked on. She didn't really grab me. Burton was given the most opportunity for a character the viewer could sympathize with. He stays behind on Alcatraz while Hemingway's group goes into the city and others go off in search of rescue, and he keeps two living zombies (or is that a contradiction?) locked up to experiment on as he looks for a cure. The attempted heart-wrenching is that one of the zombies he has locked up is his own daughter. Still, I would have to say that my reaction to most of the cast is that they were less than convincing in their roles; unenthused about playing them perhaps?

So, really, what you have here is a mediocre movie that adds nothing original to the zombie genre, and rather flat performances from the cast. Not a winner, in other words. (3/10)

Rise of the Zombies (2012)

** 1/2 (out of 4)

Semi follow-up to ZOMBIE APOCALYPSE has a group of survivors living on Alcatraz island but being forced off when the zombies make it through the water. The survivors then decide to try and locate a scientist who they believe has came up with a cure for the zombie epidemic. Yes, here's another one from The Asylum but it always shocks me that so many people go into these films expecting a good movie. I mean, we know their history, we know the film is starting on SyFy yet people still expect to see a George Romero film for some reason. Personally speaking, when I watch these movies I hope to at least be entertained (by good or bad things) or that the film at least offers something you don't normally see. I'm starting to wonder if people go into Edward D. Wood, Jr. films expecting the work of John Ford. Anyways, this film here certainly doesn't offer much that you haven't already seen but for the most part I found it to be entertaining for a couple reasons. One is that the gore factor has really been turned up and it's to the point where these made-for-TV movies are getting away with more than what theatrical slashers could back in the 80s. One sequence shows a doctor ripping off and cooking his own flesh so that he can feed his starving zombie daughter. There's another scene where a woman must perform a C-section to help save a baby but the really outrageous stuff happens after this. There's also the non-stop gore of zombie bites and zombies getting their heads blown off. The story itself offers up a few interesting ideas but of course none of them are ever fully developed. Mariel Hemingway, Chad Lindberg and LeVar Burton are the latest celebs to get down with The Asylum and all three actually turn in very good and believable performances. So, is RISE OF THE ZOMBIES going to make people forget NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD? Not at all but hopefully people won't come to this thinking it's going to.

How anyone could attempt to put some sort of positive spin on this rotting can of garbage is beyond me. I, like several others, gave it a chance because of several cast members, but even their performances were atrocious. It was painful to see the chief engineer of the Enterprise used in such a meaningless role. Several of these actors are capable of putting in good solid performances, but not in this flick. Wow! What a complete waste of talent. At times I even wondered if this was some sort of attempt to be funny, like Neil Hamburger, but like him it wasn't. This is the sort of film that has you constantly looking over your shoulder because you're horrified someone might actually catch you watching.

I rarely write reviews, but this was so bad that I had to write an angry one to warn others that may flip thru the channels and catch this, thinking what I did - "there's some awesome names in this, hopefully this gets better". I was definitely impressed with the Danny Trejo and LeVar Burton being IN the movie, even tickled to see Ethan Suplee, but that enthusiasm died early on in the movie. The acting was absolutely atrocious - these members would randomly be killed and there would be a small, ten-second emotional breakdown, then nothing happened and they just kept trucking on to an ending that made no closing sense whatsoever. Mariel Hemingway was the worst actress I had ever seen and it's unfortunate for her that I had never seen her in anything before, but now THIS is what's ingrained into my memory. I don't know if all that terrible acting was intentional or not, but it completely ruined the movie for me. Then again, as someone else said, this was produced by SyFy so there's an element of immediate shame once an 'original' movie is released by that network. There's not really anything to give away because, well, the movie ended abruptly and will leave you wanting your hour and a half back.

Rise of the Zombies: The old song went: I left my heart in San Francisco; with the Zombie Outbreak you'll be leaving other parts of your anatomy there as well.

A water-borne virus has devastated the Bay Area and likely the rest of the U.S. as well. Survivors on Alcatraz work at developing a cure but Zombies float over and almost over run the prison. Those still alive after this attack decide to leave the island, some in search of a vaccine others just to escape. One scientist stays behind.

Fairly gruesome & gory, much eating of the living and even a new-born baby Zombie is brutally dispatched.

Starring Danny Trejo, Mariel Hemmingway (channeling her grandfather) & LeVar Burton this is watchable TV movie, 5/10.

Was I surprised to see Danny Trejo on a cover of a The Asylum flick. Surely on to pick up I guessed. Wrong. Danny is in it for 30 minutes and he's gone never to see again in this zombie flick.

It starts all pretty well and rather gory for an Asylum flick so I was ready for a hell of a ride, and yes, it was a hell of a ride until the car running away from the zombies crashed on San Fransisco's Lombard Street. Pure CGI and yes, Asylum cheapie. From there on this flick falls down in a lot of blah blah and here and there some zombie attack but from here too the effects of shooting the zombies was done CGI. But it wasn't all that bad, here and there I saw some rather good effects too. But I can't say that this is a must see. It's a mediocre flick for, no pun intended, no brainers. Very simple story and nothing scary or special.

Gore 1,5/5 Nudity 0/5 Effects 2/5 Story 2,5/5 Comedy 0/5

But then again, what does one expect from Asylum.

It's just as easy to make a good film as a bad one, but it's obvious the people at Asylum just don't care to even TRY to make a good movie.

I admit - I fast forwarded through this entire movie, which was the only way possible to view this crap.

there was no story; no character development; no plot really to speak of. the filmmakers just came up with excuses to move their characters from one zombie attack to the next, stealing ideas and plot elements from Dawn of the Dead, The Walking Dead, World War Z etc....

in some scenes, the zombies lumbered, in others they ran - huh? And who knew that Zombies could swim?!? the scene with the zombies climbing up the bridge was totally ridiculous and just an excuse to show some 'nifty' f/x. by the way - they weren't.

The actors involved should be embarrassed by their participation and I can only hope they were well paid for their efforts in this pile of smelly manure.

As a zombie plague overruns mankind, a group of survivors decide to leave the supposedly fortified Alcatraz and make for the mainland in search of the scientist working on a vaccine cure and must battle the relentless undead hordes to get there.

This one wasn't that bad of a zombie effort, and while flawed this one offered up some pretty good moments. This here is mostly effective whenever dealing with the zombies on the attack as that allows for a lot of action scenes, many of them quite extended which makes them all the more fun. There's some great early action here with the opening attack on the suburban neighborhood of the zombies taking over the house leading to the mad dash to escape in the car through the streets leading into another fine attack at the end, though the massive attack on the group in their island fortress is even more fun. From the massive swarm that overruns the hallways taking along the different bodies forcing plenty of gunfire and panic to get to safety as the creatures continue pushing their way through the defenses and eating the few left stranded, this is a fantastic action scene that's incredibly lengthy and generates the kind of excitement in the opening that's required for this one to start well. The later action scenes here are somewhat enjoyable as the group gets ambushed in the house providing this one with some fun trying to hold off the attacks while the big action scene of their encounter on the bridge allows for more explosive action blowing them to pieces as well as the thrilling moments of the zombies silently emerging from the water ready to attack. As well, there's even more action encounters in the final half here with this one giving several outstanding zombie swarms from the police station encounter, the attack on beach and the biggest moment here in the attack at the research lab where there's massive fights to get past and the swarm and the frantic race to get to the escape helicopter past the creatures. The result of these action scenes here gives the film a rather frenetic pace due to the zombies being front and center, and the fact that there's the nice zombie make- up and the graphic gore to be displayed, which here is quite gruesome and really worthwhile, helping to add to this one immensely. These issues all make this one enjoyable even though there's a few small flaws here. While the frequent interjections back to the compound studying the effects of the virus are quite original, the only real problem here is the rather cliché nature of it all, managing to feel as though it's all a rip-off of the current state of zombie-dom rather than doing anything original or creative with the material, and that hurts this somewhat. Likewise, this continuous shifting back does delay some of the zombie action to a point and slow the film down somewhat during the point in the film where it's right among the point where you'd want the action to continue instead of stopping for a break. As well, there's some dodgy CGI here that creeps in at some rather odd moments that don't really need CGI which allows for some rather hard times here with scenes that shouldn't be that way. None of these are enough to be completely damaging, but it is present and lowers what could've been a great entry from the positive points here.

Rated R: Graphic Violence and Language.

Rise of the zombies is a fun trashy apocalyptic B-movie that is just Horror fun in the tradition of old grindhouse films & it also stars Cult Hero Danny Trejo which is the reason i wanted to see this film anyway!!!

Danny Trejo is underused as always? But for the time he's on screen he's Awesome as always & the best character in this cool zombie flick.

Director Nick Lyon later directed the excellent gritty Action Thriller Bullet where he teams up Danny Trejo again but this time in Bullet he gives Trejo the main lead role & it's a great role for the tough legendary Trejo!!!

This is a straight to dvd/t.v film but it's still got some cool scenes & action packed moments & actually some really cool well done practical gore fx & that gives this it's old school feel.

The gore is splattered everywhere & looks great with Awesome looking zombies for such a cheaply made movie.

Rise of the zombies is a good zombie film & definitely one of the better made ones out of the hundreds released every year it seems.

Some gory bits went too far like stamping on a zombie baby's head that was just gross & disturbing.

My main problem is wasting the ultimate tough guy cult hero Danny Trejo by killing him off so quickly!!!!

If you cast Danny Trejo in a zombie film then you use the hell out of the Awesome tough guy & watch him slash & slice his way through the apocalyptic city with a Machete!!!!

There's nothing spectacular about this little zombie survival Horror but that's absolutely fine as this is just an entertaining fun easy watching B-movie starring the awesome Danny Trejo & lots of flesh ripping zombie carnage.

A very good zombie film that although low-budget, uses everything at it's disposal to make it feel apocalyptic & dangerous with plenty of gory zombie carnage & action scenes.

Okay, this movie is bad, but - come on - you already know that, don't you? With a title like 'Rise of the Zombies' it's hardly trying to be Avatar. And it's not. It's not even just another lame entry into the seemingly never ending abyss of zombie movies out there at the moment. It's got to be one of the most awful attempts at a zombie film since 'The Dead Next Door.' And why is it so bad? Because it tries to be good.

It has no real budget. The CGI effects are truly awful (your average commercial has a higher budget). And the actors can't act. And, those who can, are given so little to work with it becomes pointless even having them there.

It's about a zombie plague, blah, blah, blah in San Francisco where people have set up a camp on Alcatraz. Only it gets overrun (pretty easily, for the record) and they head to the city to try and find a cure. Along the way expect the usual zombie headshots, people getting bitten and idiots not doing the sensible things, allowing themselves to get bitten (only all with a really low budget).

Danny Trejo is the film's highlight, but he's woefully underused. Yes, this film is bad - its major flaw is that there are simply a hundred better zombie films out there. Even those other B-movie undead films which you've probably hated are better than this.

If you like zombie films, you'll probably have seen (and own) better than this. If you don't like zombies then this one won't win you over.

Terrible if you're looking for a good horror movie but Amazing if you're looking for a movie with hilariously bad acting/special effects.

Every movie has several elements that play together, and can support each other. These elements are acting, writing, premise, plot, special effects, and level of entertainment. It provides a web the pull the viewer through the piece.

If one area is lacking, the others can make up for it, to a point.

In this movie, I am sorry to say that even the decent acting by the recognizable actors was not enough to save this bomb.

The actors did the best they could with what they had. The problem was everything else.

The writing made the characters, at best, two dimensional. From the scientist who sacrificed himself in an insane bid to save his daughter to the tough-as-nails guy, to the pilot who just wants to help, this movie was full of cliché. Even then, it could have been a campy hit with good dialog or special effects. Neither delivered, with stunningly obvious green screens, way too much gore for any but the demented son of a slaughterhouse knocker, and dialog that made my ears want to bleed.

The final insult was the last minute "And they all lived happily ever after" implication.

All in all, I wish they could refund me the time it took to make it through this atrocity.

This movie is simply the best zombie movie I have ever seen, and I've seen many.

There are scenes in it that make you think, there are scenes that seem obvious when you see them, but which other movies have not even explored.

I especially liked the visceral portrayal of the heartbreak a father feels when confronted with his zombie daughter. It was especially shocking to see the harsh, gritty, unvarnished depiction of losing friends and comrades to the zombie menace.

It will be a long time until I can forget some of the horrific scenes given to us so callously by director Nick Lyon.

Well done to the cast and crew on an excellent take of a tired genre!

When I saw the SyFy logo I must admit that my hopes and excitement went tumbling down fast, but still I wanted to watch this as it is a zombie movie - and I am a sucker for anything zombie. So I mustered up and sat through this movie, which actually turned out to be a rather nice surprise for a SyFy Channel original movie. So don't let the SyFy logo scare you away from watching the movie.

Sure, this movie borrows heavily, and I emphasize heavily, from the hit series from AMC "The Walking Dead", to the point where it almost becomes embarrassing to watch. But still, for a SyFy movie, then they really went all in with the production of this movie and managed to muster something that is rarely seen from their production line.

The zombies actually looked quite good and had interesting make-up, so it was a nice to see that they had spent some money on make-up and special effects.

There is a handful of semi-famous actor and actresses in the movie, but despite this, then the movie, acting-wise, was nothing impressive, and didn't really manage to rise over mediocrity.

I didn't fully understand the concept of why the zombies in this movie felt pain, it just didn't really work well on any account.

However, in overall, then "Rise of the Zombies" is actually a good enough movie to watch for any zombie fans. It is nothing extraordinary or exceptional, but still worth a watch.

Considering that this was The Asylum, I kind of knew what to expect. But seeing as the cast was a good one and that there have been some tolerable movies of theirs in the past, I was hoping that Rise of the Zombies would be one of them. While it is a long way from The Asylum's worst, there is very little to be seen that is good here. Danny Trejo gave a bad-ass performance and the title was great, but that was it. You don't expect particularly good production values from The Asylum, but Rise of the Zombies is one of the worst-looking films I've seen in a while. Almost all the scenes looked as though they were done in one take, there was an over-reliance on CGI backgrounds and there were too many mistakes to list. Everything just seemed too rushed. Rise of the Zombies was written terribly too. The dialogue was forced and cheesy and the sentimental scenes were more awkward than they were poignant, the latter of which is a bad thing because there was lots of it here to the point it was over-used. The story was very rushed and got ridiculous after a while. It also didn't help that the horror and suspense elements needed for a zombie movie just weren't there, there was just too much of the cheese factor(tolerable if done in spades, but all the time is too much). We have no time to care for or invest in any of the characters, they were introduced and then just went as quickly as they were introduced. Apart from Trejo, the acting is bad, Mariel Hemingway in particular is painful especially in the line delivery. Those behind Rise of the Zombies also didn't seem to know how to make the zombies- made up in a very over-theatrical fashion- behave, one moment they're lumbering, next they're running, next they're swimming(more consistency please!) Overall, great title and I enjoyed Danny Trejo, but with Rise of the Zombies that's all I can say that was good. 2/10 Bethany Cox