Night of the Living Dorks [Import]

I am on a lengthy mission to try to review every zombie movie. My latest entry is this odd little creation from 2004, "Die Nacht der Lebenden Loser" ( a.k.a. "Night of the Living Dorks"). A German Teen Romanic Comedy Zombie flick. Why not?

First, and most important, what strain of Zombie are these "Loser" Zombies? These are the voodoo created, dorky, stoner high school variety. Aside from when Konrad gets his glowing eyes and blood lust, these are mostly cognizant zombies. They have super zombie strength and x-ray vision, but are slowly decomposing and becoming victims to their hunger for flesh. This has the "Teen Wolf" vibe where being a dork makes them outcasts, but being confident monsters makes them popular. This film has a very 80's vibe, in that respect. Not much killing or fear from these zombies, but Zombie Konrad gives us some good gore. Wurt Zombie does a good job as a stoner zombie, but he still can't top Seth Green and Elden Henson as stoner zombies in the unfairly maligned "Idle Hands". Sill, I give this a decent overall zombie score of: 6/10

The gore is pretty good in this one. Not a lot of it, but a decent enough amount for a movie that is trying to be a comedy. The microwaved foot is a great gag, so for that I will give a gore score of 6/10.

Gratuitous sexism and nudity is in the mid-range. The goth girl is supplied with sexy goth lingerie for a ritual. The "hot" girl (who is not very attractive) takes her top off in the teen-sex-comedy "nerd is going to score in the bedroom" kind of way. The best is when Zombie Konrad suddenly gets x-ray vision, and can see through a girl's pants. After that he decides it's dinner time. A gratuitous sexism and nudity score of 6/10.

The movie was not very boring. The film is entertaining and kept my interest. I never found myself reaching for the FF button on the remote. Though, the film is filled with so many 80's and 90's teen-movie clichés that I was torn between comfortable nostalgia, and being annoyed at their lack of creativity. That being said, there was a great gag during and after the "sex scene" that led to some funny zombie twists on what I would have been some very "American Pie" moments. All in all, it was an entertaining flick and so on the boredom scale (0 being boring, 10 being Dawn of the Dead) it gets a 7/10. The dialogue gets a 5/10 for being a predictable teen comedy dialogue (you know the story: dork wants to date the "hot" girl who is dating the jock, while the cute outcast girl likes the dork, but the dork doesn't see her that way. Dork has two friends: a nerd and a stoner).

Overall, I think this is an enjoyable film, and worth watching. The end of the movie is very convenient and a little too easy; and as I mentioned above, the teen comedy clichés are endless (The kids clean the house after the party just in time for the parent to walk in the door. Oh no! The parents open the one door where they stuffed all the garbage! Wah-wah!). Of course, I am sure some of the experience is lost in translation while watching the movie with subtitles. I tried the dubbed track (in true "zombie movie" fashion), but the acting was too terrible to stomach.

There is no "zombies infecting and taking over" scenario, but in the extras there is an alternate ending worth watching where that was the plot, and the last 10-15 minutes of the movie are entirely different from the fuzzy/happy ending of the final cut. This movie is not going to stir up a zombie fanatic, but it is a movie a zombie fanatic could maybe watch with a date looking for a good chuckle. Though the realization that student dynamics in high school is somewhat universal across countries is far more frightening than any of the intentional scares in this movie, "Die Nacht der Lebenden Loser" still gets a solid overall rating of 6/10 (which is a pretty good rating for a zombie movie).

First off, watch it in German with subtitles. The dubbing is horrible. Which is fine with me, I almost always watch movies in their native language with subtitles.

So, on to the movie. Sure, it's simple and predictable. It's a teen zombie movie, it's supposed to be. But it hits all the right notes, and the characters are entertaining and engaging. For zombies.

I especially liked the cemetary scene with the frozen chicken, et. al.

it was an okay movie. i think it should have been a little more realistic. i did recommend it to a few people but they say the same thing - it needs a little more of something to make you get hooked and not want to leave your seat