Yes, roughly a week after looking at Bad Taste, this blog returns to the early filmography of A-list director Peter Jackson, back when he was still making low-budget gonzo movies. My friends and correspondents told me to expect more of the same from Dead Alive, but the credits told me otherwise.

Ed Mulholland signed on as Art Director for this film, and later served as a construction manager on all of Jackson’s other films, from The Frighteners to King Kong. Also — unlike that of Bad Taste — the screenplay for this movie was co-written by Fran Walsh, who would later go on to be Jackson’s wife and creative partner. Last but not least, as impressive as the makeup effects were in Bad Taste, that was still more or less Jackson by himself. He didn’t have the talent of the great Richard Taylor, co-founder and current head of WETA, who did the creature and gore effects for Dead Alive. Clearly, when contrasted against Brain Dead, the credits alone show a huge step in Jackson’s development toward his Lord of the Rings heyday.

Even the movie’s prologue becomes more interesting with hindsight. The film starts out on “Skull Island,” in which a bunch of campy-looking (read: borderline racist) natives try to stop some pompous white man from taking away a cursed monkey. A cursed monkey that’s later revealed to be a stop-motion animated monstrosity, no less. Clearly, Peter Jackson wasn’t kidding when he said that King Kong was such a huge and early influence on him.

The movie’s hero is Lionel Cosgrove, a sweet but clumsy guy who lives under the tyranny of his domineering mother. To further drive home the point that she’s cartoonishly evil, Vera Cosgrove walks like she constantly has a stick up her ass and she spends her entire introductory scene with a giant knife in her hand. Also, Lionel himself bears an uncomfortable resemblance to Anthony Perkins, but maybe I’m reading too far into this picture.

Anyway, Vera goes from being a cold and soulless parody of humanity to being… well, more of the same after she’s bitten by the aforementioned Sumatran Rat Monkey. And yet, even after his mother is turned into a homicidal member of the undead, Lionel still takes it upon himself to care for her. Then comes the purchase of tranquilizers from a mad ex-Nazi veterinarian, followed by Vera’s funeral (burying a zombie goes about as well as you’d expect), which takes place just before this beautiful gift to cult cinema. This is all before the halfway point, and the movie has only just begun to go insane.

Oh, but I suppose I should also mention Paquita, who actually shows up in this movie before our protagonist. Paquita is the female lead of the movie, who falls madly in love with Lionel. Why? It was prophesied by her grandmother, that’s why.

(Side note: I have no idea why a Latino girl has a gypsy grandmother. Additionally, I dabbled in Tarot during my high school years. I don’t know what Abuela’s doing and I don’t know what she’s doing it with, but it ain’t Tarot).

Fortunately, though she was written and portrayed with absolutely zero depth, Paquita actually has a lot to offer the movie. She provides some decent comedy and she nicely represents everything that Lionel is needlessly sacrificing for his mother, both living and undead. Furthermore, she’s quite a strong character (albeit a slightly stupid one) when the time comes, and her grandmother is kind enough to provide an all-purpose deus ex machina.

As for Lionel, this character fires on all cylinders. He’s a completely spineless idiot, but his good intentions make him endearing. When he’s trying to pretend that the zombies are normal people, it’s funny. When he finally turns into a badass in the climax, it’s awesome. This character is every bit as campy as the rest of the film, but it’s his story and he makes it work.

In terms of tone, this film is very similar to Bad Taste. Both films are outrageously camp, compensating for their technical shortcomings with solid production value and nonstop batshit craziness. The difference is that Dead Alive has a budget. It looks far and away more professional than its predecessor, with better camera work and production design all around. I realize that isn’t saying much, but still.

Far more importantly, this movie had the money and the filmmaking skill to really go for broke. Bad Taste had its moments, but the make-up effects were pretty highly concentrated into a select few powerful shocks. In Dead Alive, you’ve got dismemberment at the start, a stop-motion monster at the fifteen-minute mark, rotting body parts at the end of the first act, a great fight sequence capped with skewering at the halfway point, more rotting flesh, a few animatronics, and a lengthy climax that’s nothing but 30 minutes of gory nightmare fuel.

Dead Alive is a true cult classic. It’s a wickedly creative take on zombies that manages to be scary in spite of its campiness and hilarious because of it. Even more than with Bad Taste, this film makes me wish that the Peter Jackson of old could come back and make movies. Don’t get me wrong, I enjoy his three-hour films that cost several hundreds of millions of dollars, but the world needs more great filmmakers who can do this much with so little.