Doctor Movie: Episode 310: Zombie Death House

Show Notes

Join Doctor Movie for a look at your favorite movies from behind the steering wheel! We have a low budget burner for ya with the late 80s entry Zombie Death House. A misleading title in a few ways, but hey, we have John Saxon, so what else do ya need!!!

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Cinematic oddities and awesomeness under the watchful of the all-powerful Ming and Doctor Movie!

John Saxon is turning prison inmates into flesh-eating maniacs, and there's not a thing you can do about it.

All that and a whole lot more right here on Doctor Movie.

Let's go.

Wait a minute, I hear something.

Hey everybody, welcome back to another episode of Doctor Movie, where we're easing on down the road and talking about movies.

And boy, have we got an oddball one for you here.

This is one that popped up on Tubi as a recommendation.

Never heard of it, never knew about it.

It just, you know, hey, if you like this movie, you'll like this movie.

So I clicked on it and finally got around to it on the list.

And that movie is called Zombie Death House.

Yeah, normally not a movie that I would go, okay, because it's called Zombie Death House.

I mean, doesn't sound that appealing to me, but okay.

If it's a recommendation, we'll give it a shot.

And super, super low budget.

But with that being said, I'm quite shocked at the cast that is in this.

So let's talk about this one a little bit.

So here's a synopsis for this.

An innocent convict discovers a military plot to use death row inmates for germ warfare experiments.

Yeah, throwing the word zombie at the beginning of it is not really necessary because I don't know that you would classify these people really as zombies.

I did say flesh-eating at the opening of this.

They're more just angry.

It's kind of like the 28 Days Later version of a zombie.

Who knows?

This may be one of those ideas that was out there before that hit.

And I don't know.

That's just something to chew on because, you know, when we think of zombies, we think of zombies.

Now, there is one shot in the movie that feels a bit more zombie-ish.

And we might get to that later.

But yeah, a really good cast.

Here's the thing.

Came out, it says 1987.

What does it say at the top here?

87, horror slash sci-fi.

Again, very low budget.

Matter of fact, shot on video, I think.

When I look at it, I'm like, I'm pretty sure this is shot, not made, not straight to video, shot on video, which usually makes me go, yeah, I'm checking out, right?

Because it's more like a home movie kind of thing.

But, I kind of have to give this movie credit, and this may be why.

I don't want to give total credit for this.

But, hold on, my screen messed up.

This movie is directed by John Saxon.

Not only does he play a critical role in this movie, but he is also the director, which I read was a last-minute decision, because the original director just bailed on them last minute.

They didn't have anybody, and I think John Saxon made some, hey, I'll do it if I can get this, this, this, this, right?

And I don't know if he wanted brown M&Ms pulled out of the bowls, who knows?

You know those stories.

But yeah, he became the director, and I tell you, most of the time, like I said, shot on video stuff, I pass on, because it really takes me out of it.

This movie has no filler in it.

I'm kind of shocked at...

I don't want to say the quality.

Maybe the quality of the storytelling, because there is no slack in this movie.

There is no...

There was one stock footage shot that I saw in the entire thing.

So, I don't know.

I kind of have to give this movie credit.

I mean, it works.

Anywho, I'm going on and on.

I didn't see a budget for this movie.

I think it was $1.5 million to make this movie.

So again, super low budget.

I don't think we have a way to watch, which is disappointing.

I'm looking.

Hold on.

I don't recommend doing a podcast while driving if you're having to scroll on your phone to find things.

I don't think there's a way to watch.

Okay, we'll just make up our own.

It's low budget, thrilling, and impressive.

There's your three word review of why to watch.

Let's talk about this cast.

We got John Saxon.

Come on, you know me.

I love me some John Saxon.

Usually that's what's going to pull me into a movie if it just says it's got him in it.

I'm on board, right?

We got Dennis Cole.

Now, Dennis Cole is a face that you saw, well, our age group saw all through the 70s and 80s.

He was pretty much on every TV show made back then.

Love Boat Fantasy Island, you take your pick.

He was on every show.

And the best way to describe it, when you see him, you'd be like, oh, yeah, because he really looks like, and I know Ricky Schroeder is our age, maybe even older, but he kind of looks like, from an 80s aspect, what Ricky Schroeder would look like if he grew up, if he was an older guy.

So does he look like Ricky Schroeder now?

Eh, kind of, but he looks like if kid Ricky Schroeder grew up to be an old man and still looked kiddish.

That's the way this guy looks.

And he plays Derek Keller in this, which is funny because every time they say his name, you think they're saying killer, but it's Keller.

Who else have we got here?

Anthony Frisica from Hello!

I mean, any Tenebrary fans out there, right?

He plays Vic Moretti.

He's the gangster in this movie.

Yeah, we'll have to get in all that here in a minute.

And then you got a bunch of kind of unknowns.

This Tani McClure plays a pretty big role.

I don't know if I've seen her in other stuff.

Let's look.

Looks like she's made some kind of skin flicks, the Bikini Academy, lap dancing, Inferno with Don the Dragon, Wilson, Crawl Space, there you go.

She was in Crawl Space.

So, you know, Death Spa.

So yeah, she's one of those that not a bad actress, but at the same time is known for possibly showing some skin.

I guess you kind of needed that in this movie.

I don't know.

That's pretty much the main people to talk about here.

And again, with the budget.

But again, to have three pretty decent actors in this for a shot on video movie, it's pretty impressive, especially with getting John Saxon at least.

Who was also in Tenerbury with Franciscus.

So yeah, I mean, it's a good combination.

All right, let's talk about this one.

We've got our main character Keller, who is a Vietnam vet, but he's also a decorated soldier.

Apparently a pretty bad, pretty bad dude, right?

Knows how to do a lot of hand-to-hand combat.

He's, he's a, you know, pretty awesome.

But he's left all that behind because it's the 80s, right?

And he's trying to make ends meet.

He becomes a chauffeur for this, this mob boss, who, yeah, you got the Italian mob in this.

So he ends up being a chauffeur, and he has a wife who has taken a liking to Keller, and they start running off together and messing around.

And our mobster finds out about it and ends up killing his wife and framing Keller for it.

Puts him in prison for life.

Well, like I said, he's on death row, so he's going to be, you know, put in the electric chair.

And so you got all the inmate stories, right?

He's being introduced to all these bad characters and all this stuff.

Well, lo and behold, John Saxon is kind of watching over this area, and they are using people on death row as guinea pigs.

They're injecting them with stuff, seeing what they react to for a military scheme of creating a super soldier.

Haven't heard that before, have we?

So yeah, I mean, you know, you're not really getting anything new here, but again, under the circumstances, it's done pretty well.

And again, with this budget, the effects are pretty non-existent.

I mean, there's a couple of arms that get ripped off and things like that.

But, and you can tell it's fake.

I mean, you know, there's no denying that it's obviously low budget.

But again, the acting and the way the movie moves is really good.

This is way more enjoyable than it should have been, because you felt like you've seen this.

And what's weird is I did not, I didn't catch the beginning titles, I guess, so I didn't see that John Saxon directed this.

But when I was watching it, I was like, hey, whoever did this is a Romero fan, because a lot of the scenes are set up like George Romero movies.

You get a little bit of all the zombie flicks, plus a little bit of the crazies mixed into this.

You also get a little assault on Precinct 13, a little carpenter in there.

It has all these elements in it.

And I don't know Saxon's relationship to these flicks or if he's fans of them.

But, you know, that kind of shined through all this as far as setting the scenes up, the way they work.

Very Romero-ish, which anytime you use the word zombie, you kind of go there.

But even take that out of it, you get a lot of setup that really is the crazies.

And again, these zombies are not zombies.

They're more of the mad, going crazy super strength.

So it's really more like the crazies than anything else, which again, huge fan of the crazies.

Even to the end of the movie plays out like the crazies.

So yeah, you know, so we got our guy in the prison, killers in there.

He gets grouped up with some other people.

He becomes friends with some.

He's enemies to others.

What happens is the mob boss' brother is also in prison.

Hey, I want to see who that guy was.

Michael Pitaki.

See, he was in Dracula's Dog.

The Spider-Man TV Show.

I knew he looked familiar, Remo Williams.

So, yeah, I knew that this guy looked familiar.

He plays the mob boss's brother that's kind of running everything.

Even though he's a prisoner, he's keeping all the guards and everybody in check.

So, again, the mob owns everything, right?

So he's kind of his eyes on the inside, even though he's there because he got caught doing something and took the blame.

But he's there to also work.

He hates Keller because, you know, Keller has messed around with his brother's wife.

So he's planning on making his life, or what's left of it, miserable.

And the story kind of spins out of control from there.

I mean, you get people getting injected, people jumping up after they've been so-called dead, super strong, throwing people around.

You can't stop them.

But it's also a virus.

So the virus is spreading from person to person.

You get isolation, you get prisoners grouping together to fight the common enemy.

Again, it sets up like a Romero's movie.

And at the same time, you got Saxon on the outside monitoring everything that's going on because he wants to capture this and sell it to the military and make a bunch of money.

But things get out of control and it gets to where he starts thinking about dropping a bomb on the entire prison and killing everybody because we don't want it to escape and get out and start affecting the masses.

Right?

Just like the crazies where they bombed the entire town.

So, military makes a mistake, military has to cover up the mistake.

Right?

And that's kind of where this thing is rolling.

That's it in a nutshell.

There's a couple of scenes.

For some reason, the warden is there with his wife and kid.

There's another kid here for some reason on a skateboard.

Totally missed the whole reason for that.

But the kid on the skateboard shows Keller and them there's a way out.

The mob boss comes in there as well because his brother's being held hostage and so there's a demand that Keller has to get out of there.

He wants the mob boss there so he can confront him and try to reveal that he was framed.

So you got that story going on as well.

There's a lot going on here.

And again, there is no filler in this movie.

It is consistently movie.

But you get the mob boss who knows there's a way out.

He's trying to dig his way out with his brother, and his brother is getting sick.

And so, you know, you got that going on.

When it's all said and done, you have a showdown between Keller and the mob boss.

And then you get the scientist they bring in to try to find a cure for this stuff, which is the lady that comes in, which there's a weird dream sequence where, I mean, Keller's just met her.

I'm assuming he's just met her for the first time here.

It doesn't really play that way.

But why else would he have ever met this lady?

But, you know, she's working on finding a cure, which is, again, just like the Romero flicks.

And they kind of come up with a potion, but there's only a limited amount of it.

So they can't give it to everybody.

So you got that going on.

But like I said, the showdown, the girl, there's a dream sequence where Keller sits down for a moment to rest, and when he does, he dreams about making out with his doctor.

Yeah, so we get to see a little more skin.

And then, you know, he wakes up from it being a nightmare.

So it's one of those 50-50 dreams.

And yeah, I mean, I don't want to ruin too much more of it.

I want you to check it out.

So sometimes it's hard to talk about a movie and not talk about it, right?

Again, I'm normally not a fan of a movie that's this low-budget, but I'm impressed with this movie.

I really am.

And again, it's not the fact that John Saxon directed it.

I had no idea while watching it.

Only in hindsight did I figure that out.

So I don't know, man.

It is super low-budget.

The name is kind of misleading, but it's really not a bad flick.

If you're a Romero fan, I say check this one out.

I enjoyed it.

I'm going to give it a solid 3 out of 5, right in the middle, just because it's lacking.

You know, there's potential here that you could make this a much better movie.

The problem is there was a ton of horror prison movies that came out.

Matter of fact, one even named Prison in the 80s and 90s.

So, I don't know.

This is one that I feel like could be redone and put a bigger budget behind and it be an even better movie.

But I tell you what, for the money, the juice is worth the squeeze, man.

It's not a bad flick at all.

All right, folks, that's going to be it for this one.

And let me know if you know about this movie or if I missed something about it.

Let me know your thoughts it is on Tubi so you can check it out.

And until next time, we will check you later.