Thrilled by an excellent B-grader

OH, how I lurrrrve B-grade films! Especially B-grade horror shows. And most especially, B-grade zombie horror flicks.

And, let me tell you that Flight Of The Living Dead fits the bill on all three counts. It’s cheesiness, bloodiness and unintentional hilarity all make it just one of those incredibly bad films that any self-respecting fan of bad flicks would just love to sink his teeth into.

As with all films of the genre, FLD’s plot is simple and unencumbered. After all, who needs a deep plot when all we want to see is lots and lots of gnashing teeth, clawing fingers, spurting blood and ripped off body parts?

A team of scientists working for a dodgy medical company believes they have found a way to achieve life after death (don’t they all?).

In this particular case, it is through mutating a malaria virus found in a mosquito somewhere in the sultry jungles of Vietnam. When infected with the virus, humans are able to survive even when their organs are destroyed. Unfortunately, they also turn into flesh-eating zombies.

The first rule when you’re dealing with flesh-eating zombies is to just destroy them on sight. But do these mad scientists follow that? Noooooooo! They just have to be smart alecks and try to transport it on a plane. And what do you think happens?

The zombie gets out-lah! And this plane – which is populated by every kind of stereotype you can imagine, ranging from a nun to a couple of jocks to a law enforcement agent (who naturally is one of the heroes) to a criminal to a pro-golfer and right down to the token Asian guy who doesn’t have a line of spoken dialogue becomes a flying slaughterhouse.

And of course, every person who’s infected becomes a zombie as well.

I’m not sure if mirth was the emotion the film-makers were aiming to elicit from their audience, but that was what those watching – which consisted of less than 10 reviewers in a theatre that could have easily fit 120 – responded with.

I’m so glad that the days when airplane films were restricted to crashes and the odd clever-dick terrorist are gone.

It’s so much more fun when there are snakes and zombies on board.