What's not to like about a sudden zombie apocalypse trolling the attention seeking celeb wannabe contestants of a burned out reality TV gameshow? What's even better was that they used Channel 4's Big Brother and its original host to completely and utterly take the mick out of the tragically useless stereotypes that get picked for this show every year. Kevin Eldon did a fantastic job especially, portraying the miserable armchair politician type with a crush without a hope.
Dead Set takes a few good actors, a few television comics, and a brilliant special effects workshop and makes one of the best British efforts in horror there's been since 28 Days Later.
The great cinematography lends a lot of suspense and atmosphere, all in the right places (when it's taking itself seriously). The gore is fantastic and well executed, and the whole film - even the funny parts - are bleak.
What cheapens it for me is how quickly survival leads good characters into the clichéd survival mode reserved for Americans in B-movies. That ultimately leads to the movie's predictable ending with people dying stupidly where they don't die horrifically, but the comedy element somewhat balances that with equal measure.
I don't know if it was supposed to have some message at the end, but the one I took away was along the lines of "good, Davina's dead, let's put something else on the telly!" Never happened.
Dead Set takes a few good actors, a few television comics, and a brilliant special effects workshop and makes one of the best British efforts in horror there's been since 28 Days Later.
The great cinematography lends a lot of suspense and atmosphere, all in the right places (when it's taking itself seriously). The gore is fantastic and well executed, and the whole film - even the funny parts - are bleak.
What cheapens it for me is how quickly survival leads good characters into the clichéd survival mode reserved for Americans in B-movies. That ultimately leads to the movie's predictable ending with people dying stupidly where they don't die horrifically, but the comedy element somewhat balances that with equal measure.
I don't know if it was supposed to have some message at the end, but the one I took away was along the lines of "good, Davina's dead, let's put something else on the telly!" Never happened.