Ninjas Vs Zombies
Shawna Erholm
Ninjas vs. Zombies is a 2008 American independent film written and directed by Justin Timpane. It parodies the science-fiction, horror, zombie and ninja genres. The rough cut of the film premiered as a "bootleg screening" on October 31, 2008, and later screened on November 1, 2008 in Leesburg, Virginia at the historic Tally Ho Theatre.[1][2]
The film revolves around seven friends, three of whom are magically granted the use of ninja powers to fight back against hordes of zombies, and their evil leader Eric. The press kit for the film describes the premise as follows:
"Seven friends, struggling with late 20s, early 30s life, find themselves in terrifying danger when a long dead loved one is magically resurrected and starts devouring souls. To make matters worse, three of them have been granted the power of the ninja, and now must lead the fight against a power they cannot hope to vanquish. If they fail, the undead will overrun their little town, and maybe the world."[3]
Another horror genre publication, "Fatally Yours," urged its readers to see the film, asking: "What? Do we need to send the zombie army to drag you there?"[2] The same publication described the film as "a homegrown indy filmed right here in Northern VA. Part Evil Dead, part Clerks, part Buffy, part Bourne Identity, with some Harry Potter, a twist of vermouth and a lime chaser - uh, wait ... Funny, Violent, a Rollercoaster; with GOBS of local talent - and international appeal."[2]
On the other hand, the film has been criticized for its thematic similarity to earlier works. One critic, for example, joked that it should not be confused with 1987's singular Ninja vs. Zombie, 1997's Zombie Ninja Gangbangers, or 2004's Vampires vs. Zombies, noting, "This is, er, zombieS versus ninjaS. You know, plural?"[8]
Before its release, the film's third trailer received the following comments from movie reviewer Chris Beaumont. "Seriously, how can you go wrong? It has zombies and ninjas, not to mention magic and blood. This super low-budget outing looks terrible. Terribly good that is. No, the production values are not good and the acting looks even worse, but what they lack in quality and polish, they more than appear to make up for with energy and love for the genre. Looking forward to this!"[9]
What is with all the zombie stories out there on TV, movies, etc.? Is this like when everything had to have ninjas in it a few years back? Aren't ninjas still cooler than zombies? What's the deal?
No doubt zombies are all the rage, and have been for the past decade or so, not just in movies, television, video games and literature, but also in the fields of personal fitness, public safety and philanthropy. Groups organize costumed zombie walks to benefit charitable causes. Both public and private organizations use "zombie apocalypse preparation" exercises to teach skills for coping with somewhat more common disasters as hurricanes and earthquakes. A friend of mine has an app on his phone that simulates, through headphones, being chased by ravenous zombies to motivate him on his daily runs.
So if nothing else, a lot of folks are latching onto an immensely popular cultural phenomenon. But the question still remains: why zombies? Why not aliens, unicorns or, per your suggestion, ninjas? If you'll allow me to be a bit cynical for a moment, the answer is, as with so many things these days, about commerce.
Making a (good) movie with (convincing) ninjas requires hiring highly skilled stunt performers and perhaps even a fight choreographer to convey the mad killing skills ninjas are reputed to have. On the other hand, a reasonably effective zombie movie can begin with a few buckets of make-up, unwanted clothing and a mob of eager, unpaid extras. In a world in which people dress themselves up as animated corpses for fun on their own, it's almost hard not to have zombies wandering into any production, even if you're just filming your rom-com downtown at the sidewalk cafe.
Another thing about ninjas as opposed to zombies is that ninjas just don't seem to be so scary any more, and the whole point of much of the zombie phenomenon is to quite simply scare the Dickens into you (more on that in a bit). Just the other day I heard someone referred to as a programming "ninja." This did not, apparently mean that he was a stealthy assassin for hire who killed with coding, it just meant "really good at it." That's what overexposure can do.
As it happens, just like "ninja," the word "zombie" doesn't mean exactly what it used to. Before George Romero's "Night of the Living Dead" introduced moviegoers in 1968 to the now-familiar image of the shambling corpse consumed by the desire to eat the living, the popular conception of the zombie was more hapless body kept in thrall to a nefarious master of dark forces, as in the 1932 Bela Lugosi vehicle "White Zombie," set in Haiti. Zombies were related in the popular imagination with what was called voodoo, with the reanimated dead operating as slaves of the voodoo sorcerer and acting out his whim.
It's not hard to believe that each culture creates its own monsters to suit its own particular horrors, and the origin of the zombie legend in Haiti makes sense in that context. As a country founded by slaves who overthrew their masters only to find successive regimes just as repressive, the idea of a body remaining in servitude after death would have a special, terrifying resonance.
Bombarded with messages to buy, buy, buy almost from birth, many recent generations of Americans are ripe for entertainment that caters to their anxieties about rampant consumption and its attendant risks of obesity and addiction, not to mention moral of financial bankruptcy. The horror of the zombie apocalypse is not merely that our heroes might be killed and eaten by the walking dead, but that, even worse, they might be infected themselves and become, despite their best efforts otherwise, part of the problem and not the solution.
What catapults the zombie genre up another notch is that the undead apocalypse narrative has so much potential crossover appeal. Those who identify with the so-called "1 percent" can see themselves in the rugged heroes, forced to rely on their own craftiness to stand up to the mindless masses concerned only with filling their bellies. Those more in step with the "occupy" movement movement can identify with the struggle to remain an individual against an overwhelming tide of conformity.
Environmentalists can see an illustration of how important it is to conserve natural resources in the face of growing demand. Hucksters can see everybody making big bucks from zombies. Intellectuals can point to zombie movies as a commentary of how terrible people can be without the civilizing effects of the brain. Anti-intellectuals can point to the zombie movies as a display of how cool it is to see brains get squashed by both sides.
It's also worth noting that in our media culture's tendency to promote moral violence, zombies make the perfect villain, whether in a shoot-'em-up video game or post-disaster training exercise. Unlike a war of humans vs. humans, with its potentially upsetting questions about who the "real enemy" is, zombies are already dead: wiping them out has no ethical dilemmas built in.* And, once again, they're cheaper to make look cool than aliens, robots or ninjas.
*That being said, a lot of the better zombie fiction, like Max Brooks' "World War Z" or AMC's "The Walking Dead," use the context of the zombie apocalypse to explore the very human struggle to retain morality in extraordinary circumstances.
"Jeopardy" champ and copy editor Will Toren is The Desert Sun's resident know-it-all. He defies you to stump him. Follow Will on Twitter @WillToren for his daily downloads and send him your questions at will.toren@thedesertsun
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Within the book, England has been suffering a zombie plague the last 50 years. Many people feel a duty to battle the zombie hordes for Queen and country. The patriarch of the Bennet family has raised his five daughters to be zombie slaying maidens of death. While Mrs. Bennet just seeks to arrange proper marriages for them. While several of the daughters of the family are followed throughout the book, it does focus on the second daughter, Elizabeth, who is a free thinking and feels that she is married to the sword until she begins to encounter Mr. Darcy.
I never read the unaltered novel so I really cant compare this book to the original. The Booklist review for this book says that 85 percent of the original material was persevered in this book. It is very easy to tell where the old text was altered and the new text was added but none of it comes across as awkward. While one review of the book has joked that it takes a classic and makes it readable, in my opinion it does so but just barely. The addition of zombies, ninjas, and martial arts action are brief respites from the rest of the text which is slow moving. While I may be an uncultured barbarian to some, it is still a very slow moving book.
In looking at this book from the viewpoint of a gamer, there are a number of ideas in this book that may be of interest to those who like a bit of tongue and cheek horror in a Victorian backdrop and more specifically for people that play Unhallowed Metropolis.
For UnMet fans, people may certainly see the Bennet sisters in the role of Mourners. It was easy for me to imagine the acolytes of the Mourners Guild being trained by Shaolin and Japanese masters. Another concept is that of reclaimers people that captures zombies and turns them in for a bounty. These sound like Undertakers. One interesting twist is the idea that some unscrupulous reclaimers capture people and purposely infect people to earn their way.
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