Title:
Dead Heat aka Are We Dead Or What?
What Year?:
1988
Classification:
Irreproducible Oddity/ Parody/ Mashup
Rating:
What The Hell??? (2/4)
In the course of this feature, something I’ve thought about on and off about is what makes a “weird” zombie movie suitable for this feature. What’s counterintuitive is that I never had to worry about the movies being “too bad” for review. Conceptually creative zombie movies can usually rise to a minimum standard of mediocrity (see City of the Walking Dead and The Video Dead). On the other side of the equation, there are any number of the very worst movies I’ve encountered in this or any other genre that were never under consideration simply because their ideas are as dull as bowling balls. The one category of film that has given me trouble are zombie movies with enough “mainstream” polish that they don’t quite stand out. They may be very unusual in concept and execution, but they don’t “feel” weird (see Life After Beth). This time, I’m back with one of these, which I never really planned to be here but never would have doubted would turn up sooner or later. Here is Dead Heat, an unappreciated mid-rank filmmaker’s attempt at a zombie movie, a police procedural and a comedy.
Our story begins with a jewelry store robbery, seen from the perspectives both of the robbers and two cops, Roger Mortis and his partner/ buddy Doug. The crooks prove to be lucid enough to give commands to their victims, but a little slow at tasks like breaking open the store’s display cases. What they do have is an inexplicable ability to survive injuries, right up to when Roger and Doug destroy them with a grenade and a car. In the aftermath, a lady coroner reveals the bad guys’ secret: They were previously killed and autopsied, then somehow brought back to life. The one lead is a company called Dante Pharmaceuticals, whose late founder happens to have been researching bringing the dead back to life. When a visit to the lab leaves Roger dead, Doug and the coroner use the company’s own machine to bring him back to life, only to find that he has only a limited time before he decays away forever. With the clock ticking, the pair seek the root of the conspiracy, with a little help from the executive’s daughter. Soon, they realize the old boss may not be as dead as others believe, and his second in command is already in their own ranks. But when Doug is the next one to end up dead, it’s really personal!
Dead Heat was the first of two films directed by Mark Goldblatt, a film editor and assistant of many 1980s sci fi/ action films including the Terminator, followed by The Punisher the following year. Both films were produced by Roger Corman’s New World Pictures. The production was one of several zombie comedies following 1985’s The Return of the Living Dead, with a police procedural element similar to 1986’s Night of the Creeps. The film starred Treat Williams of Deep Rising as Roger and SNL veteran Joe Pisocpo as Doug, with a limited appearance by Vincent Price as businessman Arthur Loudermilk in one of his final roles in a theatrical film. Other cast included Lindsey Frost of The Ring as Loudermilk’s daughter Randi, Robert Picardo of Star Trek Voyager as a Lieutenant, and the original Charlie Chan Keye Luke as mid-level bad guy Mr. Thule. By all accounts, the film was a critical and commercial failure, with an estimated box office under $4 million. It apparently went on to relative success on VHS and later DVD, with many releases featuring box art that omitted the zombie and horror elements. A disc release used for this review is identified as from Top Ten New Media Productions Ltd,, and presents the film in “full screen” format.
For my experiences, I genuinely can’t tell you when I first saw this one, though I’m sure I picked up my copy in 2016. Even by the standards of this feature, it’s easily one of the most random movies I have encountered, which in itself is strange to say given that its influences are straightforward. From all indications, this one was conceived as a parody of cop/ buddy action films like Lethal Weapon as much as a zombie movie. What’s entirely curious is that on paper, it doesn’t do much to push the limits of either genre. The banter and gags between the main characters are standard for the buddy genre, albeit with more than usual self-awareness plus Williams’ superb dead-pan delivery. On the zombie front, its most interesting contribution is featuring a hero as one of the undead, albeit with full human intelligence and general faculties. It is also unique in referencing the genre at several points, notably when the coroner warns Doug to “shoot him in the head” if Roger’s resurrection goes wrong.
What pushes this film off the chart if not the rails is the sheer variety in how the undead are portrayed. Undead Roger, as already noted, is pretty much himself, with perhaps a little more focus on his final case. At least one other “character” zombie appears normal and is indicated to have survived for several years at least. The rank-and-file goons are more varied; some are clearly intelligent, while others act more like animals. As with a number of other unusual zombie films, there is no hint of zombie contagion, though the villains clearly have the means to build up their forces with earlier victims. It is also thoroughly established that these undead are exceptionally durable, to the point that only pulverization or total dismemberment seems to kill them. By comparison, we specifically see several decapitated or brain-damaged humans and animals brought back to life, including a villain who shot himself in the head. Their one real limitation is the temporary nature of the process, which unfortunately is dictated more by “plot armor” than any consistent concept. The most truly out-of-nowhere moment in the film is the literal disintegration of the above-mentioned character zombie as time catches up all at once, for no better reason than that there is nothing else worth revealing.
The big problems with the film rise from the story and especially the efforts at comedy. To begin, this is yet another comedy where I find the “jokes” less amusing than the story and dialogue in general. In that respect, the most truly laugh-out-loud moment is a surreal pitch by Loudermilk to a group of would-be investors, culminating in the remark, “God doesn’t want us dead- and if he did, we can buy him off!” It doesn’t help that we never really get a reason for most of the crimes; it can be intriguing when a villain’s schemes don’t check out with conventional logic (see The Hidden), but these are clearly characters who are at least ambitious enough to set their sights on a higher goal than the loot from a few high-end heists. Finally, there’s something close to a bait-and-switch in the outwardly light-hearted tone. The level of the humor here is literally whistling past the graveyard, and anyone expecting the comedy to translate into an upbeat story with a happy ending will be very unpleasantly surprised. If anything, even those conversant with the zombie genre will be surprised by how flat-out lethal the prognosis is for the characters in the story.
That leaves me further in than usual without the one scene. By any standard, the one sequence that will be known to everyone who has heard of the movie is the infamous scene in Thule’s butcher shop. When the police close in and try to question the villain, he gleefully turns on a reanimation machine, apparently disguised as a large lamp overhead. Bolts of energy fill the shop, bringing slaughtered and partly dismembered animals to life. At this point, I feel I must be brief or else go much longer. We see what looks like dozens of birds, a squealing pig, and an unidentifiable chunk of meat that pounces like a face hugger. The highlight to me is a case full of eggs that burst for no obvious reason. Then we hear a pounding from the meat locker , complete with several visible dents. The door bursts open, and it’s almost beside the point to describe what comes forth.
Finally, I am left with
explaining my rating, especially after giving the likes of Video Dead
and Chopper Chicks In Zombietown a pass. I must above all qualify that I
do not by any means consider this movie inferior to those or other films. But my
reviews have always been about grading on a curve. Where some deserve latitude,
others demand closer scrutiny, especially when the budget and overall talent is
at the level of this one. On a more fundamental level, however, this film is flawed
in a unique and easily foreseeable way, simply in that those involved thought
they could be everything to everyone. Instead, they arrived at a final product
that fell short for every potential audience: Too grim and gory for action
movie fans, not smart or consistent enough for zombie movie fans, and simply
not funny enough to stand on its own as a comedy. In hindsight, we can
appreciate it better, but the people who made it remain entirely at fault for
its failure in its own time.
Image credit Video Collector (UK).
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