Al Vicente, Alice Amter, Alice Basis

"American Zombie" tells the story of two Los Angeles filmmakers who set out to document a group of high-functioning zombies and their struggles to gain acceptance in human society. After weeks of foll...( read more  read more... )owing four charismatic characters, the filmmakers gain permission to shoot at a three-day, zombies-only retreat where the documentary takes an unexpected--and dangerous--turn.

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39% liked it

717 ratings

Critics

72% liked it

18 critics

Unrated, 1 hr. 31 min.

Directed by: Grace Lee

Release Date: January 18, 2007

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DVD Release Date: July 8, 2008

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Flixster Reviews (121)


  • October 8, 2009
    Is it just me or is the whole mockumenatary thing wearing a little thin? This has a few enjoyable quirky moments but overall it never really takes flight. Starting from the top, I thought the concept was great, the acting was good, but the collective quality of the material nev...( read more)er rises above 'passively interesting'.
  • April 7, 2009
    This makes Land of the Dead look Like Diary of the Dead, which still isnt saying much.
  • September 29, 2008
    I REALLY hate when a movie is so middle of the road in quality that I struggle with what I want to say about it.

    I do know that I had high hopes for this film for many reasons. The satirization of zombie movies has hit a peak this decade, and I expected another whopper to add t...( read more)o the list. I also thought it might be more insightful on the genre, and do for zombies what Behind the Mask: The Rise of Leslie Vernon did for slashers. Also, whenever you title something American ___dadada____ it had better be damn good.

    It's interesting how these zombies fit into normal society, but that's where the entertainment ends. Very minimal makeup, nothing for zombie fans to see here. Very stereotypical acting for a mockumentary that seems too influenced by 'The Office' (talkin Gervais and Merchant as well as the American bastardization) and doesn't feel realistic or fresh at all. Nice shooting for a handicam, but mind you this is supposed to be a professional documentary crew.

    There's nothing exceptionally BAD, but there's nothing exceptionally good or worth remembering. The movie does paste the zombie onto the pattern of oppressed groups and common problems within oppressed minorities well enough. But there's not any horror to justify the utter lack of comedy, and vice versa.

    Just lukewarm and leaving one with an "you could have done so MUCH better" feeling, as this movie packs more promise than your typical Z-budget, but delivers just as little.

    A once watch for zombie fans MAYBE. I can't recommend this to anyone however, and I would never screen it to anyone. It's paradigm middleness earns its a 2.5 but overall the production rates a 3 and the acting isn't atrociously but also around a 3. The separation between this film's potential and what is achieves is so great a gap that I can't in good mind give it a 3.
  • July 13, 2008
    A satirical zombie film that for the most part succeeds mainly due to the fact that it feels real. In other words if zombies were real I could see me watching this "documentary" on A&E.
    Where it fails is that it takes too long to get to the "punchline" and when you do it's not r...( read more)eally surprising and winds up leaving you cold.
    Still a worthwhile effort and certainly more enjoyable (and believable) than it's pseudo-documentary counterparts like The Blair Witch Project and Diary of the Dead just without all the headache-inducing camerawork and gimmicky feel.
  • August 6, 2009
    "Thoughts of suicide among teenagers and adults is common. You may experience rectal bleeding, shortness of breath and a drop of IQ by 102 point."

    Seriously what a load of rubbish. Take the Blaire Witch and then pile drive that into the concept of Land of the Dead but subtract a...( read more)ny coolness that you could have got from them and you got this steaming pile. I sat through to the end just to see what was up. Needless to say I'm underwhelmed. You got a film crew trying to do a "documentary" about "zombies". They try and explain how it spreads and some very pedestrian science behind it. Basically this hour and a half of boredom inducing garbage makes you start to weigh the pro's and cons of hanging yourself just to see if you can come back as a zombie and do something far cooler than these jack holes. Then again maybe the thoughts of hanging myself just seemed less painful...

    The movie never picks up. It's the same monotonous pace throughout. Ohh here is a "zombie", talk about said "zombies" life. Watch me put my junk in a door jam and repeatedly SLAM the door just to keep my pulse up. I swear to god I should have brought some atropine with me just to be able to keep my heart beating. There is nothing that saves this film. It is boring from start to finish. The culmination, if you want to call it that, is this friggen "zombie stock" thing where all the deadtards get in a circle and sing kum bye ya or some shit. You only see 2 people die throughout the entire film. It all happens in like the last 10/15 minutes.

    I love zombie movies; they are a thing that brings me much passion. I have seen a large assortment, some good and then there are some that are just bad. This is not only bad, it's an abomination. I mean at least there are people out there making Z quality films that are so low budget you can see the ketchup bottle under their shirt squirting as they get "shot". I can appreciate how they decided to take this film as a "documentary" style but it was already done. I mean what kind of fool thinks they can do a better job than the god father of Zombies Mr. George A Romero. I think the scariest thing in this movie was the...maybe it was the...or it could have been...Oh I got it, the scariest thing was definitely when I realized that I could have been watching something better with a point and a plot and story arch that has a climax. So now I reiterate my point from the attention grabber and this is how sum it up.There should be some fine print like an anti-depressant label "Thoughts of suicide among teenagers and adults is common. You may experience rectal bleeding, shortness of breath and a drop of IQ by 102 point."
  • July 29, 2009
    Another novel effort toward the still-evolving zombie genre
  • June 9, 2009
    Great Movie, I liked the mixture of Romance, Drama, and Comedy in the setting of a Zombie Documentary
  • May 7, 2009
    Took a long time to get going, but the ending is worth it.
  • February 16, 2009
    You get to follow a film crew that're doin a piece about the rising zombie population.
  • November 21, 2008
    This movie definately gets points for originality, but apart from that there's little worthy of praise. Admittedly, I'm not into the whole mockumentary thing. I liked Best in Show and Faces of Death but they were simply of a different calibur. The effort put into this film shows ...( read more)promis. I'll continue coming back to these guys with expectations of improvement. Simply put, the entire zombie mockumentary package is weakly presented. Maybe I'm a purist and it's odd to see "zombies" with all their motor functions. Yet, how else do I expect the filmmakers to convey what they want if the undead do not speak? I'm stumped, but I do know that it's worth a look if you feel your fellow revenant is being oppressed.

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