Paperjam

Shaun of the Dead

Film // Jim // 24th April 2004

It is a Tuesday night as I, along with two companions (who for the sake of anonymity I will call “Gareth” and “Sally”), enter the building site that is the Apollo cinema, Leamington Spa. Having passed up the chance to watch Chelsea stuff it up against Monaco and listen to Ron Atkinsons final historic commentary we are here to see (as I think Ron would probably say) this year’s great white hope for British cinema.

The dead: shuffling, easily fooled

As fans of the super-duper Spaced, paper-jam have been waiting to see this film since we first heard about it and there is a palpable sense of anticipation in the air while the adverts play and the trailers roll...

But before the film, a few words on cinema etiquette. I like to think of myself as fairly laid back sort of person but there are certain things that people can do in a cinema that have every chance of turning me into a mindless homicidal maniac hellbent on death and destruction. Obviously mobile phones in the flicks are a big no-no, but there are some things even more irritating, for example:

- Turning up with your baseball hatted mates having already seen the film and shouting out lines as they happen on screen. There is a place for people like you - it is called sing-a-long-a sound of fuckin’ music you total wankers.

- Getting married to someone you don’t really love, going to a job you hate, dreading the dawn of each grey depressing day as you shuffle through your meaningless middle-aged life. Your only release is going to the cinema and sitting near me, slurping your bargain sized coke as slowly and annoyingly as possible, dropping fucking malteasers on the floor every two minutes and going “oooohh, that's her out of erm, erm, that thing” every time someone half familiar appears on the screen. Bastards.

-Walking in late with your equally sad mate, loudly deciding not to sit next to each other so that people won’t think that you are gay (major denial there lads) then having a good look round to make sure that you park your large greasy unwashed adolescent head in front of someone much shorter than you. We all have to move seats in the background and pray that one day you come to terms with your confused sexuality and learn some fucking manners.

Right, on to the film, Shaun Of The Dead, (or SOD as I am going to call it from now on) is basically like an episode of Spaced except that it goes on for an hour and a half, benefits from a bigger budget and has more and better swearing than you can have on the telly. This is all good of course and that is before you factor in that SOD is a fully fledged homage to some of the best horror films going.

Pegg and Ashfield: Blood, Bit dull

In fact the makers have described it as a RomZomCom (ho ho), the only problem being that the Rom bits get a touch weak later on, happily the joke count is excellent throughout and the Zom element really kicks in towards the end with unpleasant deaths aplenty and a surprising, yet satisfying amount of blood and guts flying around the place.

Stevenson: Brief, Golf club

Simon Pegg plays the bloke from Spaced, except now he is called Shaun and works in a sub-Dixons hellhole, while Nick Frost is somewhat different to his Spaced character playing an uber-waster and wannabe drug-dealer called Ed. Ed gets by far all the best lines, the pick of the bunch being just about the first thing he says in the film. The rest of the cast is not bad either with other Spaced regulars popping up along with other comedy mafia types from The Office etc. Special mention should go to the marvellous Bill Nighy as Shaun’s miserable step-dad and Jessica Stevenson who is ace despite only appearing clutching a golf club for a total of two minutes or something.

While Shaun is busy wasting his life away and trying to keep his girlfriend happy a pesky zombie plague breaks out requiring Shaun and Ed to become unlikely heroes rescuing friends and family before heading to the safest place they can think of where smoking is also allowed, a pub.

Along the way there are plenty of in-jokes and horror film references to keep the geeks happy (the two I spotted were the bathroom cabinet shock and bluff from American Werewolf in London and the bloke being ripped to pieces from the original Dawn of the Dead) and assure SOD of later cult status.

Shaun and Ed: Unlikely heroes, Cornetto

This isn’t just one for the fan boys though, while fans of Spaced will lap it, SOD deserves to stand up on its own as a genuinely funny, slightly scary and amusingly unpleasant reason to visit your own local shit-heap, half-built, twat-infested cinema. Hooray!

Some Shaun of the Dead links...

RomZom.Com

The SOD web site, all flash and everything

Zombie actor homepage

Fuuuckinnng Hellll He's got an arm off!

IMDB SOD page

Taunt an American on the message board, it is good for you

Spaced-out

Fan site about spaced and SOD