All Souls Day

Director Jeremy Kasten

Anchor Bay Entertainment

R1 DVD

All Souls Day was first shown on the Sci-Fi Channel (USA) as one of their original film releases, being presented for TV, even cable, meant a lot of cuts. Now Anchor Bay has released the uncut version and it is far more memorable.

The movie starts in the late 1800's when a small Mexican town is celebrating the Day of the Dead. It seems they have also discovered a beautiful Shrine filled with immense amounts of treasure and gold however the local “crime lord” Vargas decides to take it all for himself. He convinces the town people to mine the treasure and then blows up the mine leaving them all to die inside. He believes that if he does this it will be the ultimate offering to the Goddess of death (to whom the shrine and treasure belonged) and that he would gain immortality.

We then flash forward to the 1950’s. A family, recuperating after their sons brush with polio arrives in the town looking for a gas station and a motel in which to spend the night. What they find is a motel nobody has stayed in since the 40’s, a very strange old woman, and a township of zombies.

The film then moves to the present, Joss (Travis Wester) and Alicia (Marisa Ramirez) are raveling through Mexico, on their way to meet Alicia's parents for the first time. Needing a place to take a break, they stumble upon what looks like a semi deserted town. As they arrive they crash their car and hit a funeral procession ! As the coffin overturns they find a still alive woman with her tongue cut out prepared for some sort of sacrifice.

Since their car is now totaled they go to a local hotel to spend the night. It is not as endearing as they hope. In order to get out of town, they place a call to a couple of friends, Tyler and Nicole, to come down and join them, of course not telling them of the real situation, they hope they can make quick escape when they arrive.

Dios de la muertos arrives and all hell breaks loose. The sacrifice kills herself in a prison cell and they need a new offering, they capture Alicia. The newcomers are not as stupid as they seem and Alicia is rescued by an armed Joss. This is now the end however, her rescue and the loss of the sacrifice triggers a general resurrection of the dead. The Zombies are loose !!

This movie is a good attempt at an unusual Zombie film, using the Mexican day of the dead and local customs add an extra element to the feel of this otherwise fairly conventional zombie flick. The acting is fairly average, Joss (Travis Wester) is never especially convincing. There are some very silly moments, especially when Nicole, who is presented as some sort of vacuous cheerleader, begins to do martial arts and flips off the roof and goes into a “Buffy the Vampire Killer” routine - it is not especially convincing.

At the same time Zombies are exceptionally well done, the special effects are professional and there is a good mood created with quite a few scares.

The quality of the filming is in 1.77:1 anamorphic widescreen, and it looks great, the sound is impressive especially the Dolby Digital 5.1 track.

In regards to extras, Anchor Bay have outdone themselves. The extras include…

Raising the Undead: The Making of All Souls Day combines interviews and on set footage to take us behind the scenes.

Faces of Death: The Makeup Effects of All Souls Day gives us an inside look at the makeup and design of the zombies.

Jailhouse Rock: The Stunts of All Souls Day. This focuses on the stunts especially the rather silly Buffy sequence..

Commentary. The track features director Jeremy Kasten and Producer Mark Altman.

Deleted Scene.
Extended Scene.
Trailer.
Storyboard Gallery.
Screenplay. The entire screenplay is included as a DVD-ROM only feature