After reading up on some voodoo material for an upcoming post last night I kind of got a hankering for some zombies. So I watched the 1979 Italian flick Zombie for the first time. I remembered this movie because of the great tag line “We Are Going To Eat You,” but for some reason always blew it off as a cheap Romero rip off. What a complete dope I was.

Zombie was directed by Lucio Fulci and starred Tisa Farrow(yes, sister of Mia) and UK born actor Ian McCulloch. And speaking of zombie master himself, George Romero, Zombie was actually titled Zombie 2 in Italy, stealthily trying to position itself as a sequel so as to capitalize on the success of Dawn of the Dead which was titled Zombi in Italy. Did you get all that?

Okay on with the plot. It begins on an abandoned boat in New York which really isn’t abandoned at all. One of the largest zombies I’ve ever seen chows down on a New York cop who goes below deck to investigate. After it’s established who the boat belongs to we meet the daughter of the boat’s owner. She quickly teams up with a journalist to find out what happened to her missing father and why there was a calorically challenged zombie on board. Then it’s off to a voodoo infested island in the Antilles. This is where the real gore begins. Now this isn’t Saw or Hostile style gore, but it’s enough that you shouldn’t really try and consume a dinner while viewing. Which…yes, I did. Not good.

Anyway you’ll get plenty of great zombie fights and deaths, as well as a fantastically disturbing score. One thing I’ve never seen though was a zombie fight a shark. It was pretty ballsy I have to say. Aquaman zombie used the shark as a chew toy for a few, actually drawing blood. And if that hasn’t peaked you’re interest, I don’t know what will.