UNDEAD OR ALIVE

A brief pre-credits prologue introduces us to legendary Native American Geronimo who, onscreen text tells us, was believed to possess supernatural powers. We're told that before he was cornered by the US Army, he perfected his final magic - a secret medicine he called "White Man's Curse".

We even get a nice scene that gives us an example of what the medicine is capable of, when family man Ben (Brian Posehn) returns to his ranch and chews the head off a pet chicken before eating his wife's brains in front of their daughter.

Then, after the stylish opening credits, an obligatory bar brawl introduces us to our out-of-town protagonists, broken-hearted cowboy Luke (Chris Kattan) and Army deserter Elmer (James Denton). Local sheriff Claypool (Matt Besser) doesn't like fighting in his small town, and has the two men locked up in jail.

With the promise of a public whipping awaiting them the following morning, and brain-eating Ben slobbering sinisterly in the cell beside them, Luke and Elmer dupe deputy Cletus (Chris Coppola) in Claypool's absence and make their escape.

The unlikely lads then catch up with Claypool while Ben gets busy chomping on Cletus in the jailhouse. Incensed to find Claypool with his woman, Luke vows to follow Elmer as part of what he sees as now being an "outlaw gang" of two. Elmer gets the money Claypool stole from him, and off the pair ride into the sunset.

Despite having promised not to follow them, Claypool quickly assembles a posse to track them down and retrieve his $1000 "retirement fund". But not before Cletus has bitten him and spread Geronimo's curse a little further, and Ben has been hung publicly in front of a willing local gathering.

Meanwhile the bungling Luke and Elmer bond over shooting practice, clumsy horse rides and cosy chats round a campfire. Elmer is keen to split up when the pair reach Colorado, but Luke is growing attached. After settling in for the evening, the men wake up more attached to each other than either had hoped - tied together, and prisoners to Indian chick Sue (Navi Rawat), niece of Geronimo.

Sue is about to take off with their $1000 when she learns that Elmer is a deserter, sick and tired of the way the Army has driven native people from their lands. Sue can empathise with this - she's hungry for revenge against the soldiers that killed her creed.

With Claypool's zombified mob hot on their heels, Elmer agrees to lead her to the Army bases in the desert - if she'll help them get to Colorado. It sounds like a fair deal, but what about the undead, approaching fast on horseback ...?

Boasting well-framed and sunny cinematography from Thomas L Calloway, and surprisingly decent production design from Mark Alan Duran, UNDEAD OR ALIVE looks fantastic a lot of the time. Lensed in attractive 2.35:1, this is a very cinematic venture that makes good use of it's sweeping exterior scenery and desert landscapes.

The relentlessly silly script, then, is almost at loggerheads with the visual grandeur of the film. But it's testament to the quality of the gags (not all of them work, but the success rate is agreeable) that the blend works. Kudos to director Glasgow Phillips for his enjoyably daft and yet effortlessly dramatic screenplay.

Performances are well observed throughout, handling the film's dafter moments with just enough restraint to prevent the film from sliding into Euro-style slapstick.

Kattan can be overbearing in other films, but he balances his delivery of Phillips' dialogue well here. An interesting cast also includes veteran TV actor Leslie Jordan as a useless priest and the lovely Rawat, who genre fans may recognise from FEAST.

Gag-wise, this is less reserved than the British humour of SHAUN OF THE DEAD, and at times akin to the goofy naivety of CANNIBAL! THE MUSICAL. But never slapstick - not quite.

Okay, there are a few old-fashioned gags that are likely to make contemporary audiences wince - the text in the intro advising "Don't worry, the part where you have to read is almost over" - but for the most part this is energetic and well-written jokes delivered with intelligence and panache.

Action-wise, the film benefits from a lean script and taut editing. The action is frequent and often gory. FX are impressive, which is not surprising as they were supervised by Robert Kurtzman. In terms of gore, the film offers a fair amount considering it's '15' rating - throat bites, finger chomping, flesh-eating, zombie heads getting battered and shot at, etc.

The tone of the film is even throughout, in that this is very much a comedy (there are even bloopers during the closing credits).

Although the zombie attack scenes are filmed with spunk, they're never presented in a bleak or oppressive manner. Horror is secondary to gags, in much the same way it was in DEAD AND DEADER. As far as modern zombie comedies go though, this is so much more fun that DAD. The only slightly schizophrenic aspect of the entire production is the score, which flits between light western noodlings during the more comedic moments and metal during a couple of the zombie attacks.

UNDEAD OR ALIVE is presented uncut in an anamorphic 2.35:1 ratio. The transfer is a solid, sharp one with good tones and texture. Colours are bold and exterior scenes are often stunning in their clarity.

English audio is provided in 5.1 with the option of English Hard-of-Hearing subtitles. The audio track is a loud and even one throughout, while the subtitles are easy to read and without noticeable errors.

The disc is graced with an amusing, colourful animated main menu page. From this, a static scene-selection menu will give you access to the film via 12 chapters.

Extras kick off with a decent commentary track from Phillips, who's accompanied by Rawat and Denton. At times the track tries too hard to be wacky but once it settles down, we get some good insights in-between the goofing around. Phillips is noticeably proud of his film, and provides the serious edge to his actors' tomfoolery. The wealth of information at hand is reason for sticking with it. Kattan turns up to join in the fun 6 minutes in.

Next up is the 14-minute featurette "From South Park To The Wild West", wherein amusing behind-the-scenes footage is interspersed with the affable Phillips' comments to the camera. Shot on video, there are lots of agreeable grins here while Phillips reveals - as the featurette title suggests - how he's a huge fan of Matt Stone and Trey Parker. It's interesting to note from the footage here that the crew was much larger than I'd suspected. Shot on video, this is presented in full-frame.

Finally we get "Geronimonsters: The Zombies That Walked The West". This is basically "From..." part 2, with more interspersing between on-location footage and Phillips talking to the screen. Again shot on video in full-frame, this offers 12 more minutes of easy viewing and focuses more towards the FX of the film.

The disc opens with trailers for the stylishly superficial THE SPIRIT (anamorphic 2.35:1), SAW 5 (1.78:1 anamorphic), the curious REPO! THE GENETIC OPERA (1.78:1 anamorphic) and the below-par BTK (1.78:1 anamorphic).

An enjoyably silly, well-shot and decently acted comedy with some good gore to boot. UNDEAD OR ALIVE comes well served on this very nice disc. Inevitably this is going to be compared to THE QUICK AND THE UNDEAD but don't let that put you off. This is good fun, well made.

Review by Stu Willis