Zombie Strippers! (2008)
"They'll dance for a fee. But devour you for free."
Plot
An elite group of soldiers is sent into a top secret research laboratory in order to deal with zombie outbreak. One of them is bitten and flees the lab, taking refuge in a nearby strip club. He bites the star stripper and it spreads the virus, turning her into a zombie. But instead of fleeing in terror, the eager punters are more prepared to throw down the cash for a private dance with her. Devious owner Ian is only too happy to encourage his dancers to become zombies to rake in the cash but things soon turn ugly and the strip club turns into a feeding frenzy.
A film that can be summed up with its title alone is a stroke of honest marketing - no pretences as to what you think you're going to get with Zombie Strippers! Usually, these type of films with such blatant and exploitative titles fail to live up to their simplistic promises but not here. You're going to get zombies. You're going to get strippers. You're going to get gore. You're going to get nudity. And there's not really much else to say. If you are like me, then it is impossible to resist watching a film with a title like this. It's also hard to knock a film that doesn't pander to critics or mainstream audiences. This is one film ‘by the boys, for the boys' and would have fit right at home in the Grindhouse 70s or the Fred Olen Ray-Jim Wynorski era of the 80s and 90s.
Zombie Strippers is so atrociously bad in every respect that it actually succeeds in becoming extremely entertaining, though not really recommended (bit of a contradiction there!). I counted four different pairs of breasts within the first ten minutes, three pole dances within the opening twenty and even more nudity after that. And if the film isn't full of naked strippers cavorting around on screen, it's full of CGI blood and guts being pumped everywhere. Zombie films get messy but this one takes it to the extreme. Heads are ripped off. Limbs torn. Plenty of heads are exploded. It takes the level of gore to cartoon-like levels at times, transcending being gross to just plain out laughable. I don't like the use of CGI gore and would much prefer the traditional technique of make-up and fake blood. But CGI gore can be whipped up on the computer within seconds and it show because the film is just awash with it all. The first few gore shots aren't too bad but then it all just wears itself out after a while.
And thus the main problem of Zombie Strippers! is evident - it's a one-trick pony and it runs out of steam too quickly because there is no real meat to the narrative. There aren't any major characters to get your teeth into. It's just a film based on the premise of its own title and the whole novelty wears thin after the first stripper turns into a zombie. The rest of the film seems like padding and a combination of zombie clichés rolled together, strung out between plenty of stripping scenes. There are minor flashes of brilliance and absurdity throughout the film (check out Jenna Jameson firing pool balls from a particular part of her body) which border on shameless brilliance but just come off way too cheesy and gratuitous to be effective. I understand they were trying to play up the silliness of the plot but there's not a lot of deliberately funny moments - anything that remotely provokes a chuckle is unintentional.
I don't know whether to feel sorry for Robert Englund or to applaud his agent for getting him the job. He's the sort of recognisable genre actor that small films like this always try to hook on board to throw onto the cover box. His performance is hilariously slimy and seedy as the club owner Ian. But is this really the sort of stuff that he has resorted to starring in? His portrayal of Freddy Kruger in the original A Nightmare on Elm Street is still as scary and nightmarish today as it ever was. But he's been relegated to genre fodder like this for most of his career. Englund gets a fair amount of screen time which is all the better as he's one of the best bits of the film.
Jenna Jameson, the world famous porn star, is looking a bit rough in this film. She used to look pretty good back in her prime but now she really does look like a zombie - the make-up department didn't need to try too hard here. Ah the wonders of unnecessary plastic surgery. I don't recall a scene where she wore a top and she gets to do a lot of pole dancing, both human and zombified. The other strippers all look just as good although it's a crime that (in my opinion) the two prettiest girls don't even get their tops off. But if you come out of Zombie Strippers! complaining about the lack of nudity, then you're a very hard person to please.
Final Verdict
Extremely tacky and sleazy, Zombie Strippers! is one of those films that every self-respecting horror fan has to see simply for the absurdity of it all. I can't recommend you watch it because on most professional levels, the film is shocking. But it's ZOMBIE STRIPPERS for crying out loud! What more do you want?
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Zombie Strippers! Director(s): Jay Lee Writer(s): Jay Lee Actor(s): Jenna Jameson, Robert Englund, Roxy Saint, Penny Drake, Whitney Anderson, Jennifer Holland, Shamron Moore, Jeanette Sousa Duration: 94 mins |  |
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