ZOMBIE HIGH (1987)
Reviewed by Jerry Saravia
Virginia Madsen plays Andrea, the newest student to a formerly all-male prestigious high school named Ettinger High. Her boyfriend, Barry (James Wilder), drops her off at the school despite his feeling that she may seek other male attention. Andrea is quickly introduced to two roomates, one is played by Sherilyn Fenn who is at first unrecognizable since there are no close-ups. The other roomate remains anonymous and is dispatched of too soon to really care.
Meanwhile, the school population is relatively sparse as is the teacher faculty (which is a sure sign of low-budget constraints). Nevertheless, there is the curious teacher, Dr. Philo (Richard Cox), who is trying to coax Andrea into sleeping with him (or does it have something to do with an old photograph that shows a remarkably similar-looking Andrea). To make a long story short and sweet, the high school is not what it seems (though it looks more like a private college). The newly admitted students are drugged in their sleep, taken to the infirmary and subjected to a medical procedure where crystals are placed in their brains. This means they can be controlled by the faculty and become successful yuppies in the future (and I thought it only took studying and good grades to get there). Now why the faculty wants to do this is something of a mystery, considering the faculty has century-old professors who have taken some magical serum that allows them to be immortals. Now they all look like old farts, but Dr. Philo looks like a thirty-something teacher who just happens to be 102 years old! Why they can't give the students the serum instead is also a mystery. There are plot holes here big enough to fit an entire high school!
A curious thing happens midway through "Zombie High": it speeds along quickly after an interminable exposition and delivers a lot of humor. Some students appear and others disappear, and Andrea takes a hell of a long time before she realizes something is cooking at this school. By the time she makes her grim discoveries, she is left with a half-hour of film time before she can destroy all the bottles containing the serum and save herself from being brainwashed into a robotic yuppie, not to mention make a police report! Then it appears Andrea's boyfriend has been brainwashed, but then it turns out that good old Dr. Philo had saved him. The question remains, how do you save a brainwashed student? Ah, it must have something to do with removing the crystal from their brains (although I thought they removed a piece of their brains before depositing the crystal).
Oh, heck, it makes no difference because "Zombie High" is simply too funny to take seriously. This is the kind of movie that features the zombified students dancing as slow as you can imagine (and in unison) but when trouble starts, they can run as if they were at a marathon. It is also the kind of movie where a classical music cassette can soothe the students' nerves (including a former student who is shown to be the President of the U.S.!) but insert some rock n' roll in their brain waves, and they are killed with a resulting puff of smoke exiting their ears! The movie looks and feels like a hysterical sci-fi parody of "The Stepford Wives" but whether it was intended as such remains a mystery.
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