The Video Dead (1987)
Blame the algorithm. Tina Romero's Queens of the Dead had just finished, I was already in a zombie mood with my critical faculties suitably loosened, and before I'd even reached for the remote the next thing had started playing. That next thing was The Video Dead, and, well. Here we are.
I'll say this for the premise: it's actually decent. A cursed television set that spits zombies out into the real world is the kind of haunted-media idea that has real legs. Poltergeist understood the horror of the TV screen, and years later The Ring would wring genuine dread from the same broad territory. As a hook, it works. The problem is absolutely everything wrapped around that hook, which falls to pieces so comprehensively and so quickly that you're left wondering whether anyone involved ever paused to think about what kind of film they were actually making.
The acting is poor. The script is poorer. The zombies themselves sit firmly in bargain-basement territory, closer to the goofy, shambling ghouls of the Return of the Living Dead pictures than to anything carrying the real menace of, say, Dawn of the Dead. There is an unmistakable whiff of straight-to-video schlock about the whole enterprise, the kind of film that existed primarily to fill a shelf in an eighties rental shop and keep the tapes moving on a Friday night. It is exactly as cheap and daft as that makes it sound, and it doesn't particularly try to be otherwise.
I've sat through some gloriously unhinged low-budget horror in my time. The Boxer's Omen is a film that runs entirely on commitment and sheer deranged ambition, and even when it makes no sense whatsoever you can feel the energy behind it. The Video Dead doesn't have that energy. It just has a good idea, a bad script, and a cast doing their level best with material that isn't doing them any favours.
There is one thing I'll hand it, though, and it isn't a small thing: the practical make-up effects are excellent. Genuinely excellent. Whoever was doing the creature work and the gore clearly had real talent, and the results are far, far better than the film surrounding them has any right to expect. It's a proper crying shame to see craft of that quality marooned in something this shoddy. When the camera lingers on the zombie effects, you catch a glimpse of the film this could have been with a better script and a bit more money behind it. That glimpse makes it more frustrating, not less.
As trash goes, it has its moments. There are worse ways to kill ninety minutes if bad-good horror is genuinely your vice, and I won't pretend I was checking my watch constantly. But a few decent gore gags and a solid central concept do not a good film make, and there's no talking myself into rating this any higher than it deserves. It's a poor film with one outstanding department, and the outstanding department deserved better company.
One and a half stars. Somewhere out there is a great make-up artist who spent their finest work on this, and I hope they went on to something worthy of them.
Rating: ★½ | Year: 1987 | Watched: 2026-08-28
Where to watch
Watch in the UK
Stream: Amazon Prime Video · Amazon Prime Video with Ads
Physical: Amazon UK · Zavvi
Watch in the US
Stream: Amazon Prime Video · fuboTV · MGM+ Amazon Channel · Philo
Physical: Amazon US
Affiliate disclosure: Movies With Macca may earn a small commission on purchases or subscriptions started via these links. It costs you nothing extra.
