GL84 Traveling to a remote small-town, an emerging hard rock band scheduled to perform in the area finds the backlash against their music so severe the town eventually kills them, only to soon be resurrected as undead ghouls seeking revenge and turning the rest of the town into zombies as well.This here wasn't all that bad although it did have a few issues. One of the few bright spots to the film is the absolutely bonkers and bizarre storyline that really doesn't make a whole lot of sense here. The fact that this backwoods town, which includes everything from inbred hicks, sexual deviants, murderous dwarves and deformities as well as being the secret hiding place of Hitler and his mistress, gives this a truly deranged atmosphere that makes for a wholly enjoyable setup. It truly doesn't seem to conform to any singular type of offensive group to be after these sorts of people as it seems to be such a varied mix that none of it makes sense as to how the town functions at all with so many disparate elements of society represented here. That weirdness carries over into the rampage where the deranged bloodlust that sweeps through the town causes a series of enjoyable scenes with them killing off the group. From the surprise ambush in the bathroom while taking a shower with one of them to the chase through the outer parts of the village and into the countryside surrounding everything which is all quite delirious fun and exciting seeing the varying kills being committed in an over-the-top gleeful manner. That their eventual rampage on the citizens of the town responsible leas into the uproarious and silly final half with all manner of fun to be had from the connection between the zombies overrunning the town and the rock bands' performance. Coupled with the fine cheesy nature of the film from the songs and the overall make-up here, these here are enough to hold off its flaws. The films' biggest problem is maintaining any kind of semblance of logic or coherence. The fact that this throws so much goofiness into the story manages to make this one seem like such a bizarre and illogical series of themes throughout here the film can't help but just go into some outre ideas. Nothing really makes sense, from why the band is booked to perform in such a town that prohibits their kind of music to begin with, to why the town reacts to them being there and how they all came together in this location. More problematic is the fact that there's no point in their resurrection which just happens and is cut off by the lone individual who knows before he can finish so that rules out any kind of background information on how the group is turned into zombies or why they only target those that originally wronged them. Why people who never got bitten by the band get turned into murderous zombies either is never brought up and as a whole nothing about the film makes any kind of logical sense. As well, the cheapness might be a major deterrent here from the overall look of the production to the storyline and how the zombies look and act which isn't for everyone, but overall this one is mostly undone but not making any kind of sense.Rated R: Graphic Violence, Language and Nudity.

Coventry Ten years ago, I would have instantly and blindly considered this to be a great film purely based on the title and awesome DVD-cover. In the meanwhile, however, I struggled myself through enough bad movies to know what a film like "Hard Rock Zombies" really stand for: multiple overlong interludes in which horrible songs are played from start to finish, a non-existent storyline build around an untalented band and of course a complete absence of atmosphere, tension or black comedy. The horrible rock band (that is so not HARD-rock they're playing) of which I can't even remember the name arrives in a little town that disapproves of music. Yes, this is somewhat of a horror parody on "Footloose" only not that funny or memorable. Instead of a puritan reverend, the band members in this town are up against demented characters like a werewolf grandmother in a wheelchair, evil midgets and the reincarnation of Adolf Hitler himself. The band losers get killed but return from the death even stupider looking than before and take their revenge. Even if you can get past the shameless Nazi propaganda footage and the totally random "Psycho" imitations, "Hard Rock Zombies" is still a dreadfully dumb and boring movie! There's an endless amount of padding, not only through lame music but also through dialog sequences that are purposelessly stretched. There's a gore, but of the lamest kind and the jokes aren't even funny when you're drunk or stoned. There's a scene, for example, in which one brainiac states: "Ghouls don't like head, so they'll let us escape". What? Next thing you see is literally people walking past the ghouls whilst holding pictures of giant heads. There's no way I can be intoxicated enough for humor like this. I do reward this retarded film with one whole point extra for the self-devouring midget. That was quite cool.

Backlash007 ~Spoiler~In my recent review for Black Roses I said that film should be viewed as part of a double bill with Rock 'n Roll Nightmare. Well, let's go ahead and make it a triple feature...with Hard Rock Zombies. Hard Rock Zombies is so ridiculous it BEGS to be seen. As does the mane on the lead singer in the flick. That mullet is ultimate 80's. HRZ's has no plot, just one bad music video after another. It's sex, zombies, Nazis, werewolf grannies, and rock 'n roll. Oddly enough no drugs though. Well, not in the film anyhow. Behind the scenes...I'm pretty sure. If you enjoy so-bad-it's-good, check this one out.

Woodyanders A simply hideous and allegedly cutesy'n'campy tongue-in-cheek horror spoof with a numbingly cheesy heavy metal rock music gimmick. A pathetic hair band called Holy Moses agrees to perform a gig in a nowheresville Northern California hamlet. Unbeknownst to the band, there's a strange family of murderous freaks in the immediate area led by a still alive Adolph Hitler (depicted here as a fat, lecherous old goat who makes love to Eva Braun while his deformed dwarf grand children watch). The band gets killed by the freaks, but come back as vengeful zombies. The band proceeds to butcher the family, only to have them return from the dead as zombies as well. The freaky family naturally attack the surrounding uptight square townspeople. Next thing you know zombies are everywhere. They engage in all kinds of broad, ridiculous, groan-inducing stupidity: a midget zombie tries to eat a cow, a little old lady zombie who also transforms into a werewolf (!?) hobbles about in her wheelchair, another midget zombie hitchhikes on the side of the road, the band performs a snazzy goth-rock number for a talent agent, and the jerky townies decide to sacrifice a local virgin to the teeming zombie horde.Sound good? Well, it sure ain't man. For starters, the tiresomely arch and pseudo-hip comic tone affects a gratingly smug and off-putting forced sense of wannabe funky-cool posturing. The gormless, sophomoric humor resorts to demeaning racial stereotypes and dopey pun-ridden dialogue ("She's a fine mama") in its pitiful attempts at eliciting cheap laughs from the audience. Krishna Shah's limp (mis)direction, working from a terribly asinine script written by Shah and David Ball, fails to inject any wit, style or vigor into the idiotic goings-on. Tom Richmond's flat cinematography falls back on dreadfully dated mid-80's MTV rock video visual clichés: madly darting to and fro pans, tilted camera angles, gauzy backlighting, and the ubiquitous curling swirl of hazy smoke billowing in the background. The hopelessly lame head-bangin' music is sheer torture on the ears. The colorless acting, an excruciatingly lethargic pace, John Carl Buechler's crummy make-up f/x, the mild gore, the uniformly obnoxious and unlikable characters, and a general air of total creative impoverishment further sink this clunker like an 80-pound boulder. The absolute dregs.