Masters of Horror: Dance of the Dead (2005)

In the near future when nuclear war has turned much of our world into wasteland the youth of America have become drug-crazed sociopaths who lawlessly prowl what s left. But for pretty teenage Peggy (Jessica Lowndes) her sheltered life is far removed from underground club The Doom Room where a depraved MC (Robert Englund Freddy Krueger from NIGHTMARE ON ELM STREET fame) provides immoral entertainment for the murderous masses. Tonight the most horrific stage show of all is about to begin and Peggy s young innocence will come to a brutal end forever.Jonathan Tucker (of HOSTAGE and the TEXAS CHAINSAW MASSACRE remake) co-stars in this extreme shocker adapted by Richard Christian Matheson from the celebrated short story by his father Richard Matheson (writer of I AM LEGEND DUEL and STIR OF ECHOES) and featuring music by Billy Corgan of The Smashing Pumpkins.System Requirements:Running Time: 60 minsFormat: DVD MOVIE Genre: HORROR Rating: NR UPC: 013131446494 Manufacturer No: DV14464 Product Description

Finally, a good one!

In the aftermath of an undisclosed conflict that has left a deadly residue in the atmosphere, the US is clearly slipping into chaos with a few pockets of normality holding out against the anarchy. Bored with her quiet existence working as a waitress in her mother's café and haunted by visions of the deaths of many of her friends at a childhood birthday party, Peggy (Jessica Lowndes) decides to accompany some shady "plasma dealers" (Jonathan Tucker and Ryan McDonald) into the big city to find out what happens in a club called the Doom Room and just what all that plasma is needed for. This little film develops real atmosphere and doesn't explain everything neatly. Rather, it allows ambiguous details to accumulate until we have a rather clear picture of what is happening by the end, a final reveal that is more shocking for what is says about human nature than the actual details and visuals of the event.

At last! After struggling through three sub par entries in the "Masters of Horror" series, we come to a good one. Unlike some other participants in the show, Tobe Hooper (he of the original "Texas Chainsaw Massacre") qualifies as a true master of horror, as does Richard Matheson, whose short story provided the inspiration for the story. I'm surprised that this episode has been rated so poorly in relation to many others, since I feel that it is a real gem.
July 21, 2007

Most like an Outer Limits episode

Not that that is a bad thing. This one is more a twist film than a horror. Sci fi twist. Like Outer Limits. May 15, 2007

A strange Sci-fi horror fable from Tobe Hooper!

In the future after a nuclear holocaust has changed the world, teen girl Peggy (Jessica Lowdnes) had a troubled childhood of seeing some of her former friends burn in the holocaust. At an underground night club called "The Doom Room", a sinster MC (Robert Englund) creates unusual but popular stage shows for the sick and twisted out there for only Peggy and her friends must find the shocking truth.

Bizarre and unusual sci-fi horror story written by Richard Matheson (writer of "Stir of Echoes", "Duel" and "I am Legend") and directed by Tobe Hooper ("The original Texas Chainsaw Massacre", "Poltergeist", "Lifeforce", "Salem's Lot"). Robert Englund whom you all know as Freddy Krueger from the Elm Street movies steals the show as MC with his character and the film does have a modern futuristic MTV feel to it but there's some interesting ideas in this story that mixes sci-fi with horror.

The DVD contains lots of goodies like interviews with the cast and filmmakers, two audio commentarires, still gallery, storyboard gallery, Tobe Hooper Bio, DVD-Rom material, and Behind The Scenes featurette.

Also recommended: "Battle Royale", "Fist of the North Star (Anime)", "28 Days Later...", "Mad Max Trilogy", "Akira", "Rats: The Nights of Terror", "The Running Man", "Starship Troopers", "Day of the Dead", "Terminator Trilogy", and "A Clockwork Orange". May 8, 2007

Less would be more for this Matheson-Hooper-Englund outing for Showtime

I totally agree. You take a story by Richard Matheson, get Tobe Hooper to direct it and give Robert Englund a choice role and you would think this outing of Showtime's "Masters of Horror" would be a real treat. Instead the result is quite disappointing and I would argue that the reason is an ironic little case of history repeating itself (insert "Twilight Zone" music here). The good news is that the special features on this DVD take away some of the sting of the experience of watching "Dance of the Dead."

Set in a dystopian future that is right around the bend, "Dance of the Dead" is about a world where something has happened and now toxic residue falls from the sky. The specifics on the war or terrorist attack are unclear, as are what exactly happens to people when they stuff falls on them, but America is clearly in a death spiral. Meanwhile, poor sweet young Peggy (Jessica Lowndes) is bored with her mundane (but safe) existence working at her mom's roadside cafe. When good looking Jak (Jonathan) and his obnoxious partner Boxx (Ryan McDonald) blow through town, she decides to take off with them and see what life is like in the big bad world out there. Of course she finds out more about death. The two guys are blood merchants, and then take Peggy to the Doom Room, where they sell plasma to the M.C. (Englund), who uses it as part of a secret Army recipe for this special juice that reanimates the newly dead for a short period of time. The Army used it to get more from soldiers on the battlefield, while the M.C. uses it to reanimate female cadavers. Use cattle prods to shock them, and you have the dead dancing for the entertainment of the wretched audience that comes to the Doom Room.

Now, in addition to turning his novel "The Incredible Shrinking Man" into the movie of the same name and "I Am Legend" into "The Last Man of Earth," Richard Matheson also did the scripts for Roger Corman's adaptations of the works of Edgar Allan Poe, most notably "House of Usher" and "The Pit and the Pendulum." For television Matheson did scripts for "Star Trek" ("The Enemy Within") and Steven Spielberg's debut effort, "Duel." But if you talk about Matheson's work on television then first and foremost you need to talk about what he did for "The Twilight Zone," where we wrote 16 scripts including the classic episodes "Nick of Time," "The Invaders," and "Nightmare at 20,000 Feet." It was when I thought about Matheson's great work on the "Zone" that it dawned on me what was wrong with this story.

After three successful seasons of "The Twilight Zone," the network executives decided that the show could be even more successful if it was twice as long, so for the fourth season episodes of the "Zone" were an hour long instead of a half-hour. Overall, the resulting episodes were big disappointments, and Rod Serling' show went back to the half-hour format for its fifth and final season. When I finished watching "Dance of the Dead" I realized the problem was that the story was twice as long as it should be. Take the first ten minutes and the last twenty minutes and the story works a lot better than it does in this bloated format. Now, it would be easy to point the finger at Richard Christian Matheson, who did the screenplay adapting his father's short story, but I think this one was doomed as soon as it was green lighted for the hour-long "Masters of Horror" format. Strip down the story as I suggest and you have the makings of a classic episode of "The Twilight Zone." The twist at the end is set up at the very beginning and by the time we get to the payoff you have probably forgotten it because the focus has become all about Jak showing Peggy the underside of the rock the world has become.

Several of the special features warn you that watching them before you watch "Dance of the Dead" will spoil the feature, which I find rather ironic. There are commentary tracks by both director Tobe Hooper and screenwriter Richard Christian Matheson." I especially liked the "Working With a Master: Tobe Hooper" featurette with its walk down memory lane, which goes along with his "Primal Screams" interview. Richard Matheson is also the subject of an interview, as are Englund, Lowndes and Tucker, all "On Set." Then you can throw in your basic behind the scenes/making of featurette, still gallery, storyboard gallery, Tobe Hooper bio, and some trailers (mostly Horrorfest stuff). In DVD-Rom mode you get the screenplay and a screensaver. Like I said, the extras here are pretty solid and I am tempted to round up on the rating because of them, but "Dance of the Dead" itself is just too disappointing given our high expectations and the rating needs to reflect that sorry fact. Check it out, but have no illusions about what you will see. April 14, 2007

Monster Mash

Written by Richard Matheson (an Outer Limits veteran with credits on "Twilight Zone: The Movie") and directed by Tobe Hooper (the gore-master who blessed the world with "Texas Chainsaw Massacre"), "Dance of the Dead" has a lot of creative oomph to live up to. Unfortunately, despite a provacative premise and electrifying directing, this "Masters of Horror" installment still sputters and stalls.

The story concerns a post WWIII-America smattered now with pockets of anarchy and new chemical scourges. Blood is let on suburban street corners in broad daylight, the scarred victims stumble about like painful, shadowed reminders of old regrets, and the living dead are unceremoniously dispatched in alley-way dumpsters. It's a gloomy portent of a human-less land, where the last glittering bits of soul that are left are either mocked, co-opted, or drowned in neon, violence, and drugs.

There isn't much of a story. Peggy (Lowndes) lives with her over-protective mother in a part of America that tenaciously holds onto old cultural mores (working at a cafe that still serves homemade apple pie). Two brash, biker boys with questionable vocations enter and one of them, Jak (a blank-eyed Jonathan Tucker -- someone buy this kid a facial expression!), falls in "love" with Peggy's antiquated, wholesome appeal. "I haven't seen anything like you in a long time," he tells her. At the hands of Jak's tutorship, Peggy learns some secrets about her past, her family, and the world she has been ignoring for so long.

All of the "Masters of Horror" clips (that I've seen so far) suffer from one real problem: timing. The shows are just barely shorter than actual movie times. Perhaps fearing the confusion of a plot that can't be squeezed into an hour, all of them have taken short story premises that would be best suited for a twenty-minute framework, and have tried to add ambience, needless (and poorly done) character development, and false scares to pad the show out to its required length.

"Dance of the Dead" is well-done and, furthermore, is an interesting story, a clever commentary on society's dismissal of the very nature and idea of death. Hooper pieces together the bits of the tale with jittering, feverish light and a patient eye for detail. (Englund as an M.C. at a macabre club of perversion and chaos is the only real weak link, overacting as the mouthpiece of the writer's real ideals ... but, then again, Englund has made his entire career out of overacting.) However, the story loses its potency because Hooper is forced to draw it out, to water it down with glaring noise and sound. Much like the title characters, Hooper keeps forcing his tale to twitch and jerk, long after it is already dead. March 29, 2007

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