After watching Dead Snow and Hansel and Gretel: Witch Hunters, it is clear to see that director Tommy Wirkola is heavily influenced by the work of Sam Raimi. Combining comedy and horror has been done plenty of times before and by a bunch of different filmmakers, but there are profound style similarities that can be seen in both Raimi and Wirkola’s work. Dead Snow had over-the-top gore and hilarious unexpected humor. Multiply those attributes by five and that’s what you get with this year’s sequel, Dead Snow: Red vs. Dead.
Red vs. Dead picks up immediately where the first entry in Wirkola’s series left off. Martin, the last remaining survivor of a getaway in the mountains, is battling his way through a horde of Nazi zombies. He manages to escape their grasp, but after flipping over his escape car, he wakes up handcuffed to a hospital bed. Running from the police is the least of Martin’s worries, however, because the Nazi creatures have left the mountain and now plan on killing an entire town’s worth of people. It is up to Martin, with the help of an American trio of zombie enthusiasts, known as the Zombie Squad, to stop Herzog and his army before they complete their mission.
Everything about this film feels bigger and better than the first — The effects are top-notch, with blood and guts flying everywhere, the acting is awesome (it was great to see Vegar Hoel reprise his role as Martin), and the comedy is side-splitting. While I do somewhat appreciate the unexpected and silly humor of the first film a tad bit more than the excessive goofiness that is seen here, I am still a big fan of Wirkola’s comedic prowess. Everything I loved about Hansel and Gretel is present here and I couldn’t be happier.
In case having an entire army of undead Nazi soldiers wasn’t ridiculous enough, Wirkola decided to up the ante a bit by having Martin resurrect another army of undead Russian soldiers. A giant battle ensues between the two zombie troops and it is quite awesome to watch. Limbs flying everywhere, intestines being torn out, and a giant Nazi-operated tank annihilating everything in its path makes for one hell of a fun flick.
If you liked the splatstick approach Wirkola had with Dead Snow back in 2009, you will certainly enjoy what he’s done with Dead Snow: Red vs. Dead. You can purchase a copy of the film on Collector’s Edition Blu-ray and/or DVD now from Well Go USA Entertainment.
I give this movie 4 cursed zombie arms out of 5.
