Awfully Good: Osombie

January 30th 2013, 2:13am

If you’re looking for a good zombie movie this week, I really recommend WARM BODIES. If you’re less discerning in your undead tastes, there’s always…

Osombie (2012)

Director: John Lyde
Stars: Corey Sevier, Eve Mauro, Jasen Wade

A yoga instructor teams up with a group of American soldiers to kill Osama Bin Laden…again!

Bet you didn’t think you’d see a sequel to ZERO DARK THIRTY this soon. In fact, if you listen closely, you can actually hear someone from The Asylum kicking themselves because they didn’t think of this concept first. (They did have the balls to make TITANIC II after all.)

News of J.J Abrams directing STAR WARS quickly spread to the Middle East.

OSOMBIE picks up where Kathryn Bigelow‘s film ends, with the navy seal raid on Osama Bin Laden’s compound. Except in this version Bin Laden’s impenetrable fortress is clearly a self-storage facility and the world’s most wanted man is just hiding in one of the lockers. Before Seal Team 6 can introduce metal to his skill, we see Bin Laden inject himself with some secret potion, which turns him and all of his followers in to undead terrorists. In keeping with historical fact, he does get a burial at sea—but only because Osombie wakes up on the helicopter and kills everyone, causing it to crash in to the ocean. We’re then treated to a JAWS “homage” where a young American couple, vacationing on the beaches of Pakistan for some reason, are attacked by Bin Laden as he emerges from the sea.

Well, that’s one way to keep your turban on.

Next, we meet a group of special forces soldiers on a secret mission in Afghanistan and they’re quite a team to say the least. One guy is always shirtless, one tells super corny jokes constantly, one pretends every person he kills is his ex-wife, one is the requisite British guy and another is Hispanic and calls everyone “amigo.” Then there’s Tomboy, the lone female soldier who uses a katana to off zombies like Michonne from The Walking Dead. Eventually the group stumbles upon another woman, a yoga instructor who’s come all the way to Afghanistan to track down her missing brother—a conspiracy nut and 9/11 survivor whose personal mission is to kill Bin Laden himself. Together, they all travel through the desert cracking wise and fighting waves of Zombie Taliban!

Sam finds out A HAUNTED HOUSE outgrossed THE LAST STAND its opening weekend.

If that sounds like a blast, I’m afraid I’ve led you astray. OSOMBIE takes itself very seriously despite the eye-rolling premise. The constant war movie clichés come off as tired instead of fun or funny. (By the fourth or fifth person to get a long, drawn out death scene, you’ll want to blow your own brains out.) It also features a lifeless script burdened by pop culture references and dialogue that reads like an even more amateur Kevin Smith, with random diatribes on everything from zombie bulimia to the show Intervention. (Example: “Let’s take five, guys.” “I’m gonna go take a number one.” “Hey now, do you take a number one or do you leave a number one?”)

BRO NAP.

It wouldn’t be so bad if there wasn’t so much damn talking in the zombie Osama Bin Laden movie. Even at 90 minutes the thing drags and is one of the most repetitive films I’ve ever seen. The soldiers talk, there’s a quickly defused zombie attack, someone dies… and repeat, no surprises. Eventually the group splits up in to smaller teams, so you can watch this same cycle twice as fast. The CGI kills and gore are mildly entertaining, but again lose their luster after the 100th headshot or so. I will say though, for an obviously low-budget production, the movie looks pretty good and the practical zombie makeup effects are outstanding.

“Dirty mouth? Clean it up with Orbit!”

I won’t get in to the potential bad taste of the film’s subject matter or blatant use of 9/11 as a plot point, but I will decry OSOMBIE’s complete lack of the title character. Zombie Bin Laden is in the movie for maybe one minute at the beginning and end and his appearances are anti-climactic at best. If you’re going to make a movie called OSOMBIE, just go for it. Don’t give me 88 minutes of filler.

A hilarious line reading and a corny joke.

Some of the best kills and action moments. BONUS: The Zombie Osama JAWS scene.

It takes place in Afghanistan. What do you think?

America! (F*ck yeah!) Buy this movie here!

Take a shot or drink every time: