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    Dead Set

    Charlie Brooker's zombie romp aired a couple of weeks ago and I managed to polish off all 5 episodes in one evening.

    Good, tautly-made stuff actually, that, perhaps, inevitably owed a lot to Danny Boyle's 28 Days Later, even down to the grim, fluttery photography and speedy undead (I know 28's monsters were 'infected' humans, so don't start). Superb performances from Jaime Winstone and the bloke who played the tyrannical producer, good playing all round (bloody hell, even Davina McCall) and it's a stronger, tightly-made thriller than you'd expect.

    If you can find it on an 'on demand' set-up, give it a go.

    #2
    Dead Set

    I watched a bit of Dead Set last night (episode 2, cos episode 1 has vanished off the cable thing), and I thought it was a bit rubbish. It doesn't add anything new to the zombie genre, doesn't do anything Shaun Of The Dead and 28 Days Later didn't do at least as well and, fatally - this is also why I hated Titanic - I couldn't bring myself to care about the plight of any of the characters.

    Another thing I didn't like about it is that I hate the dramatic stereotype of the 'feisty woman'. You know, going around shouting "DO IT, NOW!!!" and "SHUT UP!!!" and "COME ON!!!" and stuff. I'm not saying I want women to be feeble and helpless, I like them to be capable, but that tomboyish, Tank Girlish, pugnacious, in-your-face thing just gets on my tits. (In men as well as in women, mind.)

    I'll persevere with it, mind, cos I basically like Charlie Brooker and I wanna see if it gets any better, plus I'm looking out for a couple of my friends who have bit parts as zombies.

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      #3
      Dead Set

      I'm much more in line with Ian than SR on this. It's a fairly straight zombie story, but very well done on those terms. Arguably it suffers in that the setting needs to be more zeitgeisty than it is to fully justify itself, a victim of the amount of time it took Brooker to get the project greenlit. But the story's well told - I don't think every zombie film needs to "add anything new". The end of the world is surely interesting enough to tell multiple stories about.

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        #4
        Dead Set

        Ginger Yellow wrote:
        I'm much more in line with Ian than SR on this. It's a fairly straight zombie story, but very well done on those terms. Arguably it suffers in that the setting needs to be more zeitgeisty than it is to fully justify itself, a victim of the amount of time it took Brooker to get the project greenlit. But the story's well told - I don't think every zombie film needs to "add anything new". The end of the world is surely interesting enough to tell multiple stories about.
        Well, that's where I have to disagree. I basically think zombie films are rubbish, zombies are rubbish baddies, so someone needs to really do something interesting with the genre to earn my attention.

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          #5
          Dead Set

          Yeah, well if you don't like zombie films, you're not going to like Dead Set. Me, I love 'em.

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            #6
            Dead Set

            I haven't seen this (a zombie drama by the man who co-wrote Nathan Barley! Ooh, no thanks!) but I enjoyed Simon Pegg's piece on it.

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              #7
              Dead Set

              I kind of agree with Pegg, in that ceteris paribus I prefer the canonical slow zombies, but I think there's room for both kinds. The zombie flick world would certainly be a poorer place without 28 Days Later or Dead Set.

              Another thing: speed simplifies the zombie, clarifying the threat and reducing any response to an emotional reflex. It's the difference between someone shouting "Boo!" and hearing the sound of the floorboards creaking in an upstairs room: a quick thrill at the expense of a more profound sense of dread. The absence of rage or aggression in slow zombies makes them oddly sympathetic, a detail that enabled Romero to project depth on to their blankness, to create tragic anti-heroes; his were figures to be pitied, empathised with, even rooted for. The moment they appear angry or petulant, the second they emit furious velociraptor screeches (as opposed to the correct mournful moans of longing), they cease to possess any ambiguity. They are simply mean.
              Absolutely, but the point is that different kind of zombies achieve different dramatic ends. The zombies had to be impassive in, say, Dawn of the Dead to get across the satire on consumerism. Conversely in Dead Set, the obvious comparison is with the "the aggressive collectivism demonstrated by the lost souls who waste their Friday nights standing outside the Big Brother house, baying for the blood of those inside", as Pegg acknowledges. Aggressive zombies are almost obligatory.

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                #8
                Dead Set

                Yeah, that's excellent by Pegg. A cut above the usual articles by supposedly articulate comedians.

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                  #9
                  Dead Set

                  It's a cut above the usual articles.

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                    #10
                    Dead Set

                    Yeah, that's a great read. Thanks for flagging it up.

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                      #11
                      Dead Set

                      Our Cineclub showed 'Dawn of the Dead' last night and I was expecting to find it very dated and tame, but I really enjoyed it.

                      Reminded me that so-called 'genre' films were sometimes ahead of the game in terms of 'race' and gender representation in some ways.

                      I'm thinking in particular that Peter, the black guy in the 'gang of four' who hole up in the shopping mall is there as 'Peter', not as 'ooh-token black guy'. Tho' there was some interesting stuff about the lone female representative and her sense of exclusion from decisions and military action etc.

                      Also lots of 1970s nostalgia for those of us old enough to be there at the time.

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                        #12
                        Dead Set

                        Fast Zombie = Horror
                        Slow Zombies = Pisstake

                        I liked Dead Set. Mrs Max couldn't watch beyond 40 minutes of episode 1 as it freaked her out and she got nightmares. As someone who classes the Hostel movies as comedy, this was a breeze but a very enjoyable one.

                        I thought they might have taken their time dispatching Davina though. There was a place for a bit of slo-mo and repeat from different angles and they totally missed it but hey that's just me ;-)

                        **spoiler**

                        The arrogant producer getting ripped apart in part 5 was good, as was the Choppers and Army not showing up.

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                          #13
                          Dead Set

                          Fast Zombie = Horror
                          Slow Zombies = Pisstake
                          Not always. Night of the Living Dead isn't a pisstake.

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                            #14
                            Dead Set

                            I basically think zombie films are rubbish, zombies are rubbish baddies, so someone needs to really do something interesting with the genre to earn my attention.

                            Yeah, well, screen monsters are only as good, probably, as the televisual or cinematic treatment given to them, and it's only until 28 Days Later and Shaun of the Dead (I'll read Pegg's article later) that the zombie genre got a good kick up the arse it needed - in the case of the latter, you got the best of both horror and comedy worlds - until then it was probably a hoary old film here and there, or an Italian bloodfest that stayed on video in the 80's, neglected by a vast audience, Romero's stuff being the only high profile material there was. I'll probably get a 'you're so wrong' response, but that's how it seemed to me, back then.

                            Now vampires are rubbish, but there's been some spiffing treatment given to them. Prime examples are the Hammer films (the early ones, not the T&A later ones), Fright Night, The Lost Boys, Salem's Lot - I'd even pitch in a brave try with 30 Days Of Night. I even have an affection for Coppola's Bram Stoker's Dracula, which veered between ludicrous and inspired, and imbued with a loony, imaginative panache.

                            But the worst kind is where you get film vampires that prove their scariness by scrunching up their tackily made-up foreheads, baring their fangs and hissing like pissed-off geese. Do me a favour.

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                              #15
                              Dead Set

                              hissing like pissed-off geese
                              Woah, that's some scary shit right there

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                                #16
                                Dead Set

                                ian.64 wrote:
                                I basically think zombie films are rubbish, zombies are rubbish baddies, so someone needs to really do something interesting with the genre to earn my attention.

                                Yeah, well, screen monsters are only as good, probably, as the televisual or cinematic treatment given to them, and it's only until 28 Days Later and Shaun of the Dead (I'll read Pegg's article later) that the zombie genre got a good kick up the arse it needed - in the case of the latter, you got the best of both horror and comedy worlds - until then it was probably a hoary old film here and there, or an Italian bloodfest that stayed on video in the 80's, neglected by a vast audience, Romero's stuff being the only high profile material there was. I'll probably get a 'you're so wrong' response, but that's how it seemed to me, back then.

                                Now vampires are rubbish, but there's been some spiffing treatment given to them. Prime examples are the Hammer films (the early ones, not the T&A later ones), Fright Night, The Lost Boys, Salem's Lot - I'd even pitch in a brave try with 30 Days Of Night. I even have an affection for Coppola's Bram Stoker's Dracula, which veered between ludicrous and inspired, and imbued with a loony, imaginative panache.

                                But the worst kind is where you get film vampires that prove their scariness by scrunching up their tackily made-up foreheads, baring their fangs and hissing like pissed-off geese. Do me a favour.
                                Vampires are not rubbish, you maniac.

                                Zombies = rubbish
                                Mummies = rubbish
                                Frankensteins = rubbish
                                Aliens = usually rubbish
                                Serial killers = can be not rubbish
                                Draculas = not rubbish
                                Ghosts = can be not rubbish
                                Werewolves = can be not rubbish

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                                  #17
                                  Dead Set

                                  i have to say, i watched Dead Set as shown nightly on E4 and i think that wrecked it a bit. As a one off 3 hour film i believe it must have been brilliant, but episodes 2-4 for me were a bit lame. They were too short to serve a real purpose other than to very slightly advance the story in preperation for episode 5 (a bite makes you die, give the main characters a gun, and ooh, whats Rik up to?). They were also spoilt by Brooker trying to maintain a ratio of one big scare moment a night. This only gave him a maximum of 10/15 minutes to build up suspense, whereas if done in one big lump he could have took as long as he wanted.

                                  1 and 5 were good though...

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                                    #18
                                    Dead Set

                                    Spearmint Rhino wrote:
                                    Zombies = rubbish
                                    Mummies = rubbish
                                    Frankensteins = rubbish
                                    Aliens = usually rubbish
                                    SR, yesterday

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                                      #19
                                      Dead Set

                                      The Mummy (1999 version) is an excellent film. Featuring an excellent mummy.

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                                        #20
                                        Dead Set

                                        Vampires are not rubbish, you maniac.

                                        Ooh, then you haven't seen the two Underworld movies where Kate Beckinsale and Co. conspire to bring two famous mythical fantasy races - vampire and werewolf - and suck all the potential thrills of a battle between these two monolithic forces dry by being lumpen, humourless and having the former's neck-suckers look like catwalk models at a particularly crap fashion show (Ms. Beckinsale's rubber-encased arse almost stealing the attention). Or Stephen Sommers's Van Helsing, where he manages the unenviable feat of not just making vampires and werewolves look like prototypes for McDonald's Happy Meal toys, but fucks it up for Frankenstein's monster and Mr. Hyde.

                                        But then, that elite of fantasy monsters always stray on the filmmaking knife-edge between looking complete arse and absolutely brilliant. Handled with imagination and style, you get Shaun Of The Dead and 28 Days Later, make a balls up of it and you get Kenneth Branagh as Noel Edmonds in Mary Shelley's Frankenstein.

                                        On Pegg's piece - which was pretty smart - I disagree with his criticism of speedy zombies. Yes, there was an odd sympathy imbued in the slow, gangling behaviour and movement of Romero's zombies, for example, but with the fast, snarling undead of Dead Set (taken from 28 Days), there's a vicious, scarier aspect added to it. There's comic fun in the notion that you could run away from a brain-eating zombie and nip home for a piece of buttered toast before it catches up with you, but Boyle and Brooker's nippy monsters lay on the threat with a trowel. No lame scampering from a slow hulk of rotting flesh, these bastards want to chew your face and can catch you up to have a go. They're mean because they're supposed to be.

                                        And it's a shame he dumps on Zak Snyder's Day of the Dead remake. As far as a mainstream cinema zombie fests go, it's pretty smart viewing and briskly made, far better than Romero's Land Of The Dead a few years later.

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                                          #21
                                          Dead Set

                                          Zack Synder remade Dawn of the Dead, not Day of the Dead. And yeah, it was better than it was given credit for.

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                                            #22
                                            Dead Set

                                            Thanks for the reminder. There's quite a few '..of the Dead's out there, it's easy to get mixed up. 'Biscuits of the Dead'? Could happen.

                                            Or maybe not.

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                                              #23
                                              Dead Set

                                              Match of the Dead

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                                                #24
                                                Dead Set

                                                Well, it is hosted by three horrifically lifeless figures who stink dreadfully every Saturday night, frightening millions with unearthly sounds and cadaverous visages.

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                                                  #25
                                                  Dead Set

                                                  ba-dum-tish!

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