June 18, 2013 Robert Galvan

Detention of the Dead review

The nerd, the jock, the cheerleader, the bad-ass, the other nerd, and the outcast are all part of the diverse cast of The Breakfast Club no wait, I mean Detention of the Dead. Detention of the Dead is a horror comedy which blends well known stories to create a rather familiar yet different movie. It follows a group of students as well, like the title easily explains, who wind up in detention only to be faced with a breakout of some strain of zombie virus. From their detention instructor to their ‘frienemies’ and classmates, the students succumb to the virus one by one as they try to find a way to escape death.

At first I thought, “Oh another low budget zombie flick probably filmed in Canada” (Sorry Eric and Gen!), but as the movie began I realized “Holy shit this is one hell of a cast.” Jacob Zachar, aka Rusty from the hit ABC Family show Greek, acts as the nerd who takes charge. The movie also stars Max Adler, the homophobic homosexual from a very emotional and socially inspiring storyline of Fox’s hit show Glee; Jayson Blair, the deadbeat dad from the wonderful yet short lived NBC Show The New Normal; and Justin Chon, who plays the comedic geek chique friend in the Twilight Saga provided me with hope for this film. The cast is great and is made up of up-and-comers from media I was familiar with and enjoyed. Sure the cast looked a little older than high school students and even college students, but they made it work. They also had some other actors who I was not familiar with such as the Goth chick and cheerleader who both were attractive and good actors, something very rare for a movie in this genre.

You watch the students run around the building trying to find the safer and secure location until they can devise a plan for escape to safety. As the tension builds between the popular kids and the two outcasts, the role of leadership changes as people start to believe that the nerds are best equipped in dealing with a situation, you know, since they have an imagination and brains (heh). A blooming romance begins to escalate between the two nerds as it is obvious she has long had feelings for the nerd, but being a nerd he has feelings for the cheerleader. The cheerleader in turn ends up wanting to lose it before she dies with him instead of her bad-boy boyfriend. It provides some humorous scenes where he has to decide between getting some action or preventing the undead from coming in, but let’s be real here, any real nerd would rather die while hooking up with the hottest girl in school than help a friend blocking the door from the undead, right?

Over and over Jacob Zachar’s character, Eddie, winds up in humorous situations, but when faced with the death of his two girls, he takes the lead and begins fighting a hallway of the undead using pencils as throwing knives and a bat going against all odds. Overall this movie had a very Shaun of the Dead-like feeling, and with the low budget that they had, they really did a lot with it. It’s a fun and comedic ride putting that lovable twist to the normal zombie horror genre, and although there were a few cheesy parts, I would still say this movie is worth the watch if you love these kind of low budget movies but wouldn’t recommend it if you are a film snob.

Grade: B-