"Why would I want that?"
Summary:
Nathan (David Leon) is in love with his lifelong friend Jessica (Samantha Mumba). But after a botched attempt at revealing his feelings to the girl of his dreams, Nathan dies, only to be raised from the dead by his mother (Deirdre O'Kane) in a voodoo ritual. But the ritual goes awry, and Nathan awakens with a taste for human flesh, a taste that spreads once he has a run-in with a high school tough (Mark Huberman) and bites him during the altercation.
Nathan must fight his hunger to save his friends and get the girl, while his mother tries to find a cure for her son's condition.
Nathan must fight his hunger to save his friends and get the girl, while his mother tries to find a cure for her son's condition.
Starring:
Samantha Mumba as Jessica, the object of Nathan's affections, who is probably the only high school girl (real or imaginary) I've ever seen who is proficient in both kickboxing and the operation of heavy farm machinery.
David Leon as Nathan, the angsty protagonist whose love for Jessica drives much of the plot. The typical male romantic lead from basically every teen movie ever, except that he's a zombie.
Tadhg Murphy as Diggs, one of Nathan's two closest friends. Intelligent but awkward, Diggs is the typical "geeky sidekick" from basically every teen movie ever.
Laurence Kinlan as Henry, Nathan's other close friend and a foil to Diggs for much of the film. Although outwardly not as awkward as Diggs, Henry is often just as insecure, particularly once people start getting eaten.
Sara James as Cheryl, Samson's pseudo girlfriend. Cheryl has set her mind and, seemingly, most of the rest of her body to the task of wooing Nathan because, unlike the rest of the school, he pays no attention to her. The typical "mean girl" from every teen movie ever.
Mark Huberman as Samson, Cheryl's thuggish pseudo boyfriend and Public Enemy #1 to Nathan and his crowd. The typical ringleader bully from every teen movie ever.
Deirdre O'Kane as Grace, Nathan's mother. When her son dies before her eyes, Grace uses an ancient voodoo text she found in the crypt of the local church to raise her son from the dead. And a movie was born.
Deirdre O'Kane as Grace, Nathan's mother. When her son dies before her eyes, Grace uses an ancient voodoo text she found in the crypt of the local church to raise her son from the dead. And a movie was born.
Review:
Going into this, I wasn't exactly expecting a triumph of modern cinema. I was expecting a pretty standard teen movie, but with zombies. And I got a pretty standard teen movie, but with zombies and Irish accents. So right away, the film exceeded my expectations.
Granted, standard teen movies tend to tick me off in a variety of ways. Characters tend to be one-dimensional and stereotyped, conflicts and motivations tend to be frustratingly juvenile, damned near everything revolves around sex (except, usually, for the "pure" love of the protagonist[s]), almost everyone is either beautiful or a "nerd," and there is always, always a school dance. But to give Boy Eats Girl low marks for resembling the movies it parodies strikes me as unfair. So I won't.
I will, however, give Boy Eats Girl low marks for execution. As a teen movie parody, it's not especially insightful. Sure, the "mean" crowd mostly gets its comeuppance, but that's no different from any other teen movie. Not Another Teen Movie spoofed the genre far more effectively a few years back.
Boy Eats Girl doesn't exactly blaze new trails as a zombie movie parody, either, though it does take the road less traveled by getting back to the voodoo roots of the zombie. The voodoo approach makes Nathan's lingering humanity more believable than in some other "talking zombie" films I've seen (Zombie Honeymoon springs immediately to mind), though I find myself wondering why 2nd generation zombies (see: bite victims) simply become mindless killing machines. In the end, if you're looking for a zombie parody, then Shawn of the Dead and/or Zombieland are much stronger films.
So there have been better teen movie parodies, and there have been better zombie movie parodies. So what? That doesn't mean Boy Eats Girl can't be good, does it?
Of course not. Unfortunately, beyond simply being overshadowed by other films, Boy Eats Girl suffers from some pretty major weaknesses. First and foremost, I don't legitimately care about any of the characters. Sure, I empathize with Diggs, Henry, and Bernard (a very minor, very geeky character). But that's not a result of the film giving me any real reason to care about them; it's a result of my being a colossal nerd, and therefore automatically empathizing with and rooting for pretty much anyone characterized as a nerd in any film ever. The characters are too flat and formulaic for me to develop any legitimate bond with any of them. Most of the acting is solid (though the weakest performances are probably the two leads), but if an actor, even a talented actor, is given a caricature to work with, what can we realistically expect that actor to do with the role?
But not caring about the characters goes beyond my inability to really like any of the characters. I'm also not able to really dislike any of the characters. The "bad guys," like the protagonists, are so stereotypical it's almost funny (except not funny), so when the film starts killing off the bullies (in both living and undead form), I'm not exactly happy or even interested. Not even when the filmmakers go out of their way to dole out gruesome punishments to the various antagonists.
Which brings me to my next point. Directors, please: just because your movie has fellatio and zombies within the same 90-minute span does not, I repeat, does not, mean that a zombie has to start biting people's dicks off. I've seen this way too many times, folks. I'll ignore the plot problem (why would a human being allow a zombie to start the fellatio process, let alone "finish" it?) for now and skip to the fact that biting off anything is not intrinsically funny or shocking in a zombie movie. Unless you're directing a full-on splashfest, the gore is secondary stuff in a zombie flick. Director Stephen Bradley and writer Derek Landy seem to understand this at some level, as the bite happens out of frame, but still─I saw this coming from a mile (45 minutes) away, and I was still annoyed when it happened. And it's not like they shy away from gore; many of the zombies die in a showdown against a thresher (after inexplicably stopping around our "heroes" and forming a zombie circle despite showing no hesitation at any other point in the film, I might add). You can imagine the mess.
Were these the only problems in the movie, it would still probably get 2.5-3.0 stars from me because, as I said, I wasn't expecting a film that would set the world on fire (though there was, of course, the very real chance that Boy Eats Girl may have set its own world on fire, being a zombie movie and all). But the film also suffers from some very awkward pacing pretty much any time Grace's voodoo dabbling is involved. The first two times we see the book are accompanied by loud, multilayered screams/chants and frantic, jerky montages. This would merely be annoying were it not for the fact that the second such screamy montage takes us from the moment of Nathan's death, through (or, rather, past) his mother's voodoo ritual, and into the next day. Now I understand that the ritual itself is less important the results of said ritual, but this is just too much. We get 30 minutes of high school romance exposition, and then 3 seconds of the pivotal plot moment in order to "move things along"? With the cheap startle factor of accompanying screams and flashes of light? Yikes.
Boy Eats Girl has its moments. I found myself actually bobbing my head ridiculously to the poppy soundtrack a few times (and I watched this thing while sick as a dog), and Diggs and Henry get some fun (albeit formulaic) lines throughout. And let's not forget the fact that I am very definitely not the target audience for this film. Maybe the youngins will like this one more than I did, especially if they go into the film lightheartedly rather than with a critical eye.
As for me, though, I'm left with a couple possibilities: Maybe Boy Eats Girl is a mediocre parody. Maybe it's just a little too dead-on to function effectively as a parody. Either way, I found the film entertaining enough for a couple stars, but doubt I'll be watching it again any time soon.
Granted, standard teen movies tend to tick me off in a variety of ways. Characters tend to be one-dimensional and stereotyped, conflicts and motivations tend to be frustratingly juvenile, damned near everything revolves around sex (except, usually, for the "pure" love of the protagonist[s]), almost everyone is either beautiful or a "nerd," and there is always, always a school dance. But to give Boy Eats Girl low marks for resembling the movies it parodies strikes me as unfair. So I won't.
I will, however, give Boy Eats Girl low marks for execution. As a teen movie parody, it's not especially insightful. Sure, the "mean" crowd mostly gets its comeuppance, but that's no different from any other teen movie. Not Another Teen Movie spoofed the genre far more effectively a few years back.
Boy Eats Girl doesn't exactly blaze new trails as a zombie movie parody, either, though it does take the road less traveled by getting back to the voodoo roots of the zombie. The voodoo approach makes Nathan's lingering humanity more believable than in some other "talking zombie" films I've seen (Zombie Honeymoon springs immediately to mind), though I find myself wondering why 2nd generation zombies (see: bite victims) simply become mindless killing machines. In the end, if you're looking for a zombie parody, then Shawn of the Dead and/or Zombieland are much stronger films.
So there have been better teen movie parodies, and there have been better zombie movie parodies. So what? That doesn't mean Boy Eats Girl can't be good, does it?
Of course not. Unfortunately, beyond simply being overshadowed by other films, Boy Eats Girl suffers from some pretty major weaknesses. First and foremost, I don't legitimately care about any of the characters. Sure, I empathize with Diggs, Henry, and Bernard (a very minor, very geeky character). But that's not a result of the film giving me any real reason to care about them; it's a result of my being a colossal nerd, and therefore automatically empathizing with and rooting for pretty much anyone characterized as a nerd in any film ever. The characters are too flat and formulaic for me to develop any legitimate bond with any of them. Most of the acting is solid (though the weakest performances are probably the two leads), but if an actor, even a talented actor, is given a caricature to work with, what can we realistically expect that actor to do with the role?
But not caring about the characters goes beyond my inability to really like any of the characters. I'm also not able to really dislike any of the characters. The "bad guys," like the protagonists, are so stereotypical it's almost funny (except not funny), so when the film starts killing off the bullies (in both living and undead form), I'm not exactly happy or even interested. Not even when the filmmakers go out of their way to dole out gruesome punishments to the various antagonists.
Which brings me to my next point. Directors, please: just because your movie has fellatio and zombies within the same 90-minute span does not, I repeat, does not, mean that a zombie has to start biting people's dicks off. I've seen this way too many times, folks. I'll ignore the plot problem (why would a human being allow a zombie to start the fellatio process, let alone "finish" it?) for now and skip to the fact that biting off anything is not intrinsically funny or shocking in a zombie movie. Unless you're directing a full-on splashfest, the gore is secondary stuff in a zombie flick. Director Stephen Bradley and writer Derek Landy seem to understand this at some level, as the bite happens out of frame, but still─I saw this coming from a mile (45 minutes) away, and I was still annoyed when it happened. And it's not like they shy away from gore; many of the zombies die in a showdown against a thresher (after inexplicably stopping around our "heroes" and forming a zombie circle despite showing no hesitation at any other point in the film, I might add). You can imagine the mess.
Were these the only problems in the movie, it would still probably get 2.5-3.0 stars from me because, as I said, I wasn't expecting a film that would set the world on fire (though there was, of course, the very real chance that Boy Eats Girl may have set its own world on fire, being a zombie movie and all). But the film also suffers from some very awkward pacing pretty much any time Grace's voodoo dabbling is involved. The first two times we see the book are accompanied by loud, multilayered screams/chants and frantic, jerky montages. This would merely be annoying were it not for the fact that the second such screamy montage takes us from the moment of Nathan's death, through (or, rather, past) his mother's voodoo ritual, and into the next day. Now I understand that the ritual itself is less important the results of said ritual, but this is just too much. We get 30 minutes of high school romance exposition, and then 3 seconds of the pivotal plot moment in order to "move things along"? With the cheap startle factor of accompanying screams and flashes of light? Yikes.
Boy Eats Girl has its moments. I found myself actually bobbing my head ridiculously to the poppy soundtrack a few times (and I watched this thing while sick as a dog), and Diggs and Henry get some fun (albeit formulaic) lines throughout. And let's not forget the fact that I am very definitely not the target audience for this film. Maybe the youngins will like this one more than I did, especially if they go into the film lightheartedly rather than with a critical eye.
As for me, though, I'm left with a couple possibilities: Maybe Boy Eats Girl is a mediocre parody. Maybe it's just a little too dead-on to function effectively as a parody. Either way, I found the film entertaining enough for a couple stars, but doubt I'll be watching it again any time soon.
2.0/5.0
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