![]() ![]() But as a lonely child who has no friends and is often bullied, Timmy eventually befriends their zombie, who he names Fido (Sir Billy Connolly), as he treats the zombie much like a faithful pet dog. Never having had to deal with a zombie directly, Timmy is initially wary of their zombie. But Helen feels pressured to get a zombie when Zomcon's new head of security in Willard, the officious Jonathan Bottoms (Henry Czerny), moves into the neighborhood with his family. Bill has thus become fascinated with funerals to see zombies put away permanently. In the town of Willard, the Robinsons - father Bill (Dylan Baker), mother Helen (Carrie-Anne Moss), and adolescent son Timmy (Kesun Loder) - are one family who don't own a zombie as a domestic, since Bill is afraid of zombies, as, when he was a child, he had to shoot his own zombie father, who tried to eat him. Zomcon is the go to organization for all things zombie. And all people, adult or child, learn to shoot to kill to protect society. Because all dead initially become zombies, the elderly are viewed negatively and suspectly. Conversely, Zomcon has created the domestication collar, when activated and placed on a zombie makes the zombie controllable, and thus an eternally productive creature within society. Their ultimate disposal is through cremation, or burial, the latter which requires decapitation with the head being buried separately from the body. Zombies can be temporarily neutralized by being shot, but can only be permanently neutralized by their brain being destroyed. A company called Zomcon has been able to control the zombie population. In an Earthly world resembling the 1950s, a cloud of space radiation has shrouded the planet, resulting in the dead becoming zombies that desire live human flesh. Personally, I wouldn't recommend this film to people who aren't yet acquainted with silent cinema, especially since there are numerous of other genuine masterpieces to discover ("The Cabinet of Dr. "Waxworks" features beautiful color schemes and imaginative decors, typical of German expressionism, but the pacing is too slow, and the stories are sadly unmemorable. This is, however, merely an insignificant epilogue and I was quite disappointed by that. Then, you notice there's less than five minutes of running time left, but there supposedly still comes a segment with Werner Krauss as Jack the Ripper. It seems like the Czar is just abusing his power at a wedding party, terrorizing all the other guest, but eventually he believes he was poisoned and spends the rest of his days tipping over a (zandloper). As much as I admire Veidt's charismatic looks and his facial expressions of pure madness, I honestly can't guess what the point of the tale was. The second tale stars my favorite actor from the silent era, Conrad Veidt, as the Russian Czar Ivan the Terrible. The premise is interesting enough, but the story lasts far too long. The baker, crazy jealous, wants to prove his manhood by breaking into to the palace and steal the Caliph's wishing ring. The first tale stars the Emil Jannings as the Caliph of Bagdad, and he's trying to woo the lovely wife of a simple baker. They actually are rather dull, incomprehensible and - in case of the first two - unnecessarily overlong. I truly wished I could say that the three individual segments were little masterpieces, but alas. The charming young man who presents himself doesn't only invent stories about the statues, but also processes himself and the sculptor's beautiful daughter in them. The resident wax-sculptor of a traveling carnival places an ad in the paper, looking for a writer to fantasize imaginative stories for his creations. ![]() ![]() The genius "Dead of Night" (1945) might have been a much better film, but "Waxworks" must have been the first. Director Paul Leni! Cast members Werner Krauss, Emil Jannings, William Dieterle, Conrad Veidt! What a cast! And the plot is so unique I even daresay "Waxworks" was the one and only forefather of the horror omnibus/anthology concept. The concept of the film is brilliant, and the names of the people involved are downright amazing! It seems as if everyone who was even remotely important during the German expressionism era was partaking in this film. ![]() "Waxworks", for instance, is much more fascinating from a 'historical value' point of view than from an 'entertainment' angle. I don't want to be harsh or negative on movies from the silent era because, after all, they were the true pioneers, but some of them are really an ordeal to struggle through. ![]()
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