Pro Wrestlers Vs Zombies

Pro Wrestlers Vs Zombies

Any movie that carries the title “Pro Wrestlers Vs Zombies” is one which you would expect to be a FUN horror flick, a good natured romp where we as viewers can scarf down some popcorn and just enjoy the cheesy nature of the whole enterprise. It’s NOT supposed to be something that plays itself off as trying oh so hard to be one of the darkest (literally as the lighting is terrible), bleakest viewing experiences possible on a totally cut rate budget of $250K filmed on location in the moviemaking beacon known as West Virginia. In general, its large cast of very well known pro wrestling legends (including several Hall Of Famers) just goes to show how (sadly) so many members of the pro wrestling community have just turned themselves into total whores after their primary careers are over and done with, literally not caring where and what they’re going to be paid to do just as long as the money is there (and in many cases, it’s a mere pittance) and with this particular film, one can only imagine the casting call fiasco when the notices went out with the money being offered and the filmmakers wound up hearing from so many guys who had competed in front of stadium crowds of 50,000 and up only to now be salivating for the chump change being offered to work for a director who clearly doesn’t even have a technical grasp on the fundamentals of actual filmmaking like one Cody Knotts. But a specific problem would appear to be that of a famous wrestler named Shane Douglas (a.k.a. The Franchise), a guy who mostly made his name in ECW as their World Champion and long running top heel (i.e. bad guy) after washing out of both WWF and WCW (and insisting to people that he has a long time real life hatred of Ric Flair and even doing in ring promos about it all while Flair would just laugh it off whenever the subject was brought up to him) and whom on this project even took on the role of a “producer” apparently teaming up with the supremely untalented Knotts to bring this story to life while at the same time allowing himself in the film (literally playing himself like the other top guys did) to be portrayed as being an unseemly, nasty son of a bitch who catches his road girlfriend screwing another wrestler (as it turns out, his opponent that night) and then literally killing that same guy in the ring by hitting a purposefully stiff piledriver. Later on when the zombie mess is ongoing, Douglas as himself is further portrayed as being the first one to fuck over his fellow wrestlers who are trying to escape with him so that they get eaten but at least he gets away. The aforementioned killing of that other wrestler in the ring is what sets off the plot as the dead wrestler’s brother (Ashton Amherst) turns out to be a Satanist who vows revenge by kidnapping an innocent nurse and then brutally (and unpleasantly) sacrificing her, doing so in such a way that the poor woman comes back to life as a zombie with the ability to create other zombies with merely a bite. The brother’s plan is to build a small army of zombies under his control and then lure Douglas to an abandoned West Virginia prison for a “private” wrestling show, making sure of course that the upfront money for Douglas is so good that he can’t turn it down. Of course, in order to not arouse suspicion, other wrestlers must also be booked for the same show so that Douglas doesn’t figure out that he’s walking into a deliberate death trap. That’s how we get some of the other big names involved here including (the real star of the movie) Rowdy Roddy Piper (less than a year before his tragic passing from a heart attack), whom it goes without saying gives the best performance out of anybody here and is seen as being the senior member of the crew who commands the most respect from everybody (they’d better) including the temperamental Douglas (the script tries to fake a longstanding friendship between the two even though they barely crossed paths much in their own real life careers) but given Piper’s extensive movie acting experience (starting with They Live) and even considering some of the low budget stinkers that he has been a part of, he almost seems too good to be in this unlike some of the other guys who must have come running for that quick money. They include Matt Hardy along with his soon to be wife Reby Sky, portrayed as being two dumbasses who think nothing of sneaking off to a nearby room in order to screw even after the attack begins. Then there’s Hacksaw Jim Duggan and his 2×4 using his piece of wood to bash some zombie heads in but never being truly allowed to get any kind of shining moment in this mess. Then there’s Kurt Angle, showing up for 5 minutes as he gets attacked coming through the door, gets zombified, has a 3 on 1 match in the ring against Piper, Douglas and Hardy and then is never seen again even though he would have made a great head zombie for the rest of the film if they had wanted him to. Naturally, the film features several little known indy guys (or “jobbers”) who try to make an impression before getting eaten along with a number of females, some playing themselves as wrestling personalities and others cast as actual characters (it always amazes this viewer just how often in the low budget realm one would see actresses who are cast in ingenue / glamourous lead roles who really aren’t all that good looking to begin with) but nobody ever succeeds in commanding the screen like Piper does although Douglas with his toxic, constantly bellowing persona certainly seems like he’s trying. The film does succeed on delivering the gory goods on the FX for the zombie kills, but the equally gory scenes showing the vengeful Satanist brother (who carries a Robert DeNiro In Angel Heart style cane and sports an annoyingly over the top Irish accent) conducting his sacrifices on innocent women who had nothing to do with his idiot brother’s death (including ripping them open and eating their hearts) are more disquieting and distasteful than anything else and only succeed in taking the fun factor out of the whole enterprise. It’s hard to remember the last time any horror movie combined elements of both zombies and murderous Satanists, but here it comes across as being an unhealthy mix, especially when it’s unclear if the Satanist brother intends to use his zombie hordes to also take over the world as well or just walk away from the whole thing once Douglas and the other wrestlers are dead. There’s also the unpleasant factor of Douglas himself being portrayed as having a family unit consisting of his brother, his brother’s wife, his precocious nephew and even his mom all being characters here, only to have the Satanist kidnap, kill and zombify all of them before unleashing them onto Douglas in what is obviously a devastating attack both emotionally and psychologically and which sees Douglas actually take the little boy zombie who was once his nephew (and wearing a Franchise t shirt) and breaking his little neck as one wonders what Douglas’ REAL family would have made of this particular scene (granted, at least they were all actors playing his family and not the real thing). But all that aside, the real failure is on the technical side of things with several examples on top of that: the editing is so sloppy and clumsy that from scene to scene we see the main group moving through the prison trying to escape and then suddenly we see 1 or 2 people who had just been part of that group now alone and being attacked with no explanation whatsoever for how they got separated not to mention that the lighting and cinematography is so painfully dark that we can hardly make out who’s who most of the time (except thankfully for Piper). The sound issues also come into play as it appears that there may have been NO live sound on set, leading to most of the dialogue appearing to have been dubbed in along with the sound effects and an annoyingly BLARING music soundtrack consisting of cut rate heavy metal filling in for most of the sound design along with the occasional complete dropout of any sound whatsoever which sticks out like a sore thumb (and is inexcusable for any low budget film in 2014). Piper does at least get to use a coconut on a zombie (ala Snuka) and in the emotional high point comes upon a dead, zombified Duggan eating brains and with tears in his eyes, picks up Hacksaw’s own 2×4 laying nearby in order to finish him off. But the many technical screwups, unnecessary Satanic touches and Shane Douglas’ in your face asshole personality sinks this one lower than the Titanic…

2/10

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