THE SADNESS - streaming on Shudder and AMC+
This Taiwanese update on the inner city zombie outbreak is a strange, uneven, yet relentless beast of a film. Definitely not for the faint of heart as the gore is insanely gruesome and stomach churning. I have a pretty high threshold when it comes to cinematic violence and I found myself wincing more than once; the bloodletting is in that video nasty grindhouse vein a la I Spit On Your Grave and makes Tom Savini’s work look like amateur hour.
I mentioned the film is uneven and that’s due to stop-and-go pacing, which initially is kind of frustrating. There are bouts of intense violence followed by seemingly long stretches of dialogue that feels like needless mansplaining exposition. This technique also made it predictable as to when crazy stuff was going to jump off. It was distracting until I realized that it may very well have been intended to mimic the actions of the zombies.
The film manages to mix in Covid hysteria, politics, and conspiracies rather nicely, too. As for the ending, at first it feels like a complete cop-out. But when you realize the subtle nastiness of it, it becomes quite brilliant.
Oh yeah, stalwart horror geeks should no doubt recognize the obvious homage to films like Dawn of the Dead, Night of the Comet, and The Crazies (though I recently learned that it may have been influenced by Crossed, a comic book written by Garth Ennis (The Boys)--yeah, I may be slippin').
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