Zombie Flesh Eaters (1979) Review

After an incident in New York bay a reporter and a scientist’s daughter travel to an Island aided by two locals. However, the dead are returning to life on the Island… The zombies long for human flesh and the pair find themselves in hopeless situation.

My thoughts on the film haven’t changed over the years. Not to be confused with Bruno Mattei’s Zombie Creeping Flesh (1980) (a.k.a Virus, Hell of the Living Dead to name a few) Lucio Fulci’s Zombie Flesh Eaters (1979) is far superior. Conflicting reports say that a draft was written prior to Dawn of the Dead (a.ka. Zombi) (this maybe unfounded) but most horror fans are aware that the name Flesheaters was changed to Zombi 2 and a new ending was tagged on to cash in on Romero success. You could argue that the talked about soundtrack is as intrusive as Dawn of the Dead music themes and that the eye scene is better than Argento’s vocational displays.

Comparisons to other movies aside Zombie Flesh Eaters suffers from Lucio Fulci’s (who also cameos) own trappings – including badly written dialogue, choppy editing and bad dubbing. That said, there are very few directors that capture atmosphere you can taste. Fulci’s cinematic look is heightened by Giorgio Cascio and Fabio Frizzi’s excellent eerie and foreboding score.

The supporting cast are more than sufficient, leads Tisa Farrow and excellent Ian McCulloch are more than adequate, note worthy is Richard Johnson as Dr. David Menard. Both Johnson’s limited screen time as Menard and McCulloch as Peter West hold the film together. Memorable are ill-fated beauty Olga Karlatos and Pierluigi Conti (credited as Al Cliver) an Italian B version of Jeff Bridges as Brian Hull. Reliable Dakar appears as Lucas. Notorious are Auretta Gay’s topless shark versus zombie set up and Karlatos’ Paola eye piercing scene. But Flesh Eaters is so much more, Fulci creates some unmatched ambiance, the visuals are as lingering as the dead, dusty paths, an old Spanish cemetery, darkness lit up by Molotov cocktails and so on.

Zombie Flesh Eaters with all its low-budget faults is a creepy, slow paced, effective zombie film. Recommended.