Dead Alive (Braindead) (1992)
Average Rating: 7.3/10
Reviews Counted: 29
Fresh: 25 | Rotten: 4
The delightfully gonzo tale of a lovestruck teen and his zombified mother, Dead Alive is extremely gory and exceedingly good fun, thanks to Peter Jackson's affection for the tastelessly sublime.
Average Rating: N/A
Critic Reviews: 4
Fresh: 3 | Rotten: 1
The delightfully gonzo tale of a lovestruck teen and his zombified mother, Dead Alive is extremely gory and exceedingly good fun, thanks to Peter Jackson's affection for the tastelessly sublime.
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Average Rating: 3.8/5
User Ratings: 62,928
My Rating
Movie Info
Director Peter Jackson's second feature cheerfully trumps the gross-out quotient of his splatterfest debut, the appropriately named Bad Taste. The tone is cartoonishly comic, and the premise is simple: The village dweeb (Timothy Balme) is trying to maintain a budding romance with the sweet Paquita (Diana Penalver) while concealing the fact that his overbearing mum (Elizabeth Moody, in an amazing good-sport performance) is a flesh-eating zombie. (She owes her condition to a bite from a "Sumatran
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Cast
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Timothy Balme
Lionel -
Diana Peñalver
Paquita Maria Sanchez -
Elizabeth Moody
Mum (Vera Cosgrove) -
Ian Watkin
Uncle Les -
Brenda Kendall
Nurse McTavish -
Stuart Devenie
Father McGruder/Zombie ... -
Davina Whitehouse
Paquita's Grandmother -
Forrest J Ackerman
Forry -
James Grant
Tram Driver -
Ken Hammon
Featured Party Zombie -
Tony Hiles
Zoo Keeper -
Peter Jackson
Undertaker's Assistant -
Jamie Selkirk
Father at Zoo -
Duncan Smith
Drunk -
Angela Louise Robinson
Courtney -
Peter Vere-Jones
Undertaker -
Sarah Scott Davis
Featured Party Zombie -
Jim Booth
Lionel's Father -
George Port
Lawrence -
Chris Short
Customs Official -
Frances Walsh
Mother at Park -
Nick Ward
Spud -
Brian Sergent
Vet
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All Critics (29) | Top Critics (4) | Fresh (26) | Rotten (5) | DVD (12)
The best to date from Kiwi gore specialist Peter Jackson.
The finale, in which Lionel reduces a horde of flesh-eaters to a mulch of blood, flesh and offal with the aid of a flymo, is probably the goriest scene ever.
Top CriticBecause all of this looks blatantly unreal, and because the timing of the shock effects is so haphazard, Dead Alive isn't especially scary or repulsive. Nor is it very funny.
Horror films used to be primordial spook shows, tapping midnight-dark fears. Now they tap bodily goo: rivers of blood, dripping limbs, eyeballs that go pop in the night.
Takes a few views to really appreciate, but Peter Jackson's blood-splattered horror masterpiece is a gory good time.
Lionsgate's visceral, albeit barebones Blu-ray package lets viewers really sink their teeth into Dead Alive.
Originally released as Braindead, this gory, maccabre satire of 1950s New Zealand society is yet another proof that Peter Jackson is one of the sharpest, most skillful directors working in the genre; a good companion piece to Meet the Feebles.
Rarely has the urge to expectorate one's lunch been a feeling so sublime.
Braindead is the magnum opus of Peter Jackson's early career.
perhaps the most hysterically wild, all out gore extravaganza to grace a horror fans screens to this day!
Arguably the goriest movie ever made
I wish I could say that I loved it, but at the risk of offending every fanboy out there, I'm afraid I have a red caro-syrup covered bone to pick with it.
A gore classic featuring an ***-kicking priest, a grandmother swallowing a cat whole, a house full of zombies, and a lawnmower.
Audience Reviews for Dead Alive (Braindead)
Super Reviewer
Super Reviewer
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- Lionel: They're not dead exactly, they're just... sort of rotting.
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- Paquita Maria Sanchez: Your mother ate my dog!
- Lionel: Not all of it!
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- Lionel: Party's over!
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- Lionel: Party's over.
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- Father McGruder/Zombie McGruder: "I kick ass for the Lord!"
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- Paquita Maria Sanchez: "Your mother ate my dog!"
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Foreign Titles
- Dead Alive (DE)
- Braindead (UK)
