Yes, it somehow all comes together. This is a July 13, 2010 radio interview I did with Molly Matlock, Executive Director of ChathamArts and host of “Inside the Artist’s Studio” on WCOM-FM in Carrboro, NC.
Molly put it best in her program description: “Now to the Zombies. Today on “Inside the Artist’s Studio,” ChathamArts interviews James Bryson Hyatt about the NC film industry, making music videos, and how zombie movies hold the key to a better world.”
Sadly, I know way more about zombie movies and what they say about us as individuals and as a society than any normal person should. Wait, “normal”… 😉
Hard to believe this film came out in 2006, but “Fido” is definitely worth checking out: an alleged zombie flick, this is far more a black social comedy than it is a horror spoof. I caught the first 8 minutes of it at a certain famous film festival that takes place in mid-Jan in Utah, but had to head to another film that was getting more buzz. I told myself I’d circle back and watch the whole thing…. and it took me until last night to get that done.
What the film’s creator’s got right:
I was pleasantly surprised. It was funny, bizarre, unique, smart, well-acted, well-shot and entertaining, so 3 stars out of 4. Billy Connolly is unrecognizable as the title character (that’s fine; he’s playing a zombie, for christ’s sake, so it’s not like he’s up there in Elephant Man territory…), and Carrie-Anne Moss was stunning as the mom — gorgeous, smart, flirtatious, multi-dimensional — and for the first time, I really wanted to take her home, take off that apron, and get into a long-term, intelllectually significant and socially committed relationship with her, if you know what I mean.
But good acting all around. It would be easy to go way over the top with this kind of material, but there’s a lot of control here, which works for the overall effect.
The tone is generally upbeat, even tongue-in-cheek, and they carefully balance the fact the protagonist is a young (and vulnerable) little boy against the needs of the larger narrative, without doing extremely horrible things to said kid.
Also, it’s a great-looking film, from the too-perfect 50s suburban neighborhood, the cars, the clothes and other details, to the framing and composition.
What the distributors got wrong:
Nearly everything? I mean, do YOU remember this film opening in your town? I don’t, and I was looking for it.
Also, this is the worst poster imaginable for this film. The Fido character turns out to be a decent guy, but the public is going to look at the art and say “Another zombie film. Meh.” And they’d be right — nothing says this is a comedy, nothing says this has a happy ending, nothing says C-A Moss is in this, smoking it up with hotness. All it says is you’ll have your face eaten off by an overly made-up actor from the UK — and that you can see in “28 Days Later” or “Shaun of the Dead”.
But this screw-up shouldn’t stop you, the savvy DVD renter or video-file downloader, right?
Heck, I’d even recommend this as a date movie. Not a first-date movie unless you know the other person REALLY, REALLY well, but trust your uncle Jimi on this one.
James Hyatt 