Horrorfest 2010: Re-Animator

My favorite horror films also tend to be comedies. Maybe this is because I tend to like comedies more than horror films, so if a horror film is spiced up with a little bit of comedy, it's easier for me to swallow. I'm not sure. All I know is, from BRIDE OF FRANKENSTEIN to EVIL DEAD and even to the satirical DAWN OF THE DEAD and the recently-seen-by-me AMERICAN WEREWOLF IN LONDON, it's becoming increasingly clear I like my bloodshed sprinkled with laughter.

So, it should be no surprise that RE-ANIMATOR was right up my ally. RE-ANIMATOR stars the great Jeffrey Combs as Herbert West, a medical student who thinks he has discovered the secret to eternal life -- a glowing green serum that raises corpses from the dead. He even tries it out on his own mentor at an institute in Switzerland. Unfortunately, he overdoses his mentor with tragic results.

Cut to a hospital in Boston, where affable medical student Dan Cain (the equally affable Bruce Abbot) idealistically trains to save lives. After hours, he's secretly dating fellow medical student Megan (Barbara Crampton) who also happens to be the daughter of the school's dean, Halsey (Robert Sampson). Seems Halsey is kind of old fashioned and frowns on fraternizing between students, especially ones who happen to be his daughter.

West shows up to continue his studies, and disagrees with the local brain surgeon Dr. Hill (David Gale). Hill has apparently ripped off some of West's late mentor's theories and, according to West, has gotten them horribly wrong. Needless to say, they immediately dislike each other.

It's not long before West is moving in with Dan, who has posted a notice for a roommate, much to the chagrin of Megan who has enough of a head on her shoulders to be creeped out by West and wonder what exactly happened back in Switzerland that made him leave in disgrace. West sets up a makeshift laboratory in Dan's basement and gets to work on his crazy experiments, starting with re-animating a dead cat.

Here's the thing: West's miracle serum has a disturbing side effect that causes any re-animated life form to immediately go on a kill-crazy rampage. So, it's awesome that it brings people and animals back to life, but it sucks that it turns them into blood thirsty zombies. Still, West and Dan eventually team up to try to perfect the serum and prove its greatness, which leads to a domino effect of bodies piling up and bloody mayhem breaking out in the hospital.

The movie works because of the balance between comedy and horror -- there's plenty of gore that the likes of Lucio Fulci would be proud of, but here it's at the service of an exciting, well paced, break-kneck story and a series of squirm inducing visual and physical jokes.

Aside from that, the rest of the movie falls squarely on the shoulders of Jeffrey Combs as the resident mad scientist, West. Man, is this guy great. He over acts and chews scenery in ways that would make fellow mad scientists like Colin Clive (FRANKENSTEIN) proud. But, he also has a great comic sensibility. It's not just an overactive "evil" performance -- it's somehow also an understated comedic one. Riddle me that one -- how do you overdo the evil and underdo the comedy -- AT THE SAME TIME? Combs does it. Why can't guys like this win Oscars? Oh well, at least he got to play a bunch of good characters in STAR TREK. Nerd alert.

The thing about Combs as West is that he's a total dick, but you also sympathize with him. In the early scenes it looks like he's going to shape up to be the villain, but eventually it's an all out war against an army of the undead, led by a headless doctor who carries his own head around and kidnaps Megan in an attempt o have his zombie way with her. By this time, it's every man for himself, and Combs emerges as somewhat of an anti hero. Not in the sense of, say, Han Solo who is an anti hero in the sense that he's out for himself and begrudgingly comes around to helping the forces of good. More in the sense of. . . I don't know. . . an arrogant asshole who just happens to be right all the time and eventually comes in handy? Sure, West causes all the problems he and Dan eventually have to mop up, but you have to admire his enthusiasm as he wields bone saws and injects glowing green serum into every dead thing he sees.

Anyway, RE-ANIMATOR is a rollicking good time that never stops for a breath. It's one of those movies where you can tell everyone had a good time making it. Just because it's a gory horror film doesn't mean it has to be grim. All the characters are likable, even if you love to hate them, and the momentum effortlessly carries you through to an ever-escalating climax featuring more bodies popping up off of slabs that you can shake a stick (or an axe) at.