The Age of Commercialism

Admirable film.

The film creates a perfect balance between action and depth of basic needs, in the midst of an infertile atmosphere.

A clunky actioner with a handful of cool moments.

"The Lost Tape: Andy's Terrifying Last Days Revealed" is a 16-minute live action short from 2004 and this one's closely connected to the popular "Dawn of the Dead" as we find out a bit more about one of the minor characters from one of Zack Snyder's better received films. It's all about the found footage component here, so the camera is static being put up by the title character, which means no great camera work, but still a convincing film overall. And that is pretty much 100% thanks to lead actor Bruce Bohne who carries this convincingly as a one-man show from start to finish. The longer it went, the more enjoyable it gets. The situational comedy about the character of Andy lets you forget at times how much of a tragic story this little film actually is. I guess we can be lucky that we don't have to live during the same scenario like Andy overall, regardless of broken our own world is. But takes it too far perhaps. Back to this one here: From what I saw, I'd probably also watch a full feature film about the character. The lead performance was top-notch and the contrast between the scenes in the past and in the now was handled pretty well. Overall, this short film is easy to enjoy, even if you haven't seen the big blockbuster movie from which this is a little spin-off like in my case. The title spoiler isn't a problem either as it is much more about the "how" and "why" than about the "if". I give it a thumbs-up and recommend checking it out.

This is found on the DVD of the Director's Cut version of the Dawn of the Dead remake of 2004. Like the other extra features on there, it kind of underwhelms. The way it's produced is fine... they couldn't market it as a video diary if the camera wasn't just placed somewhere in front of Andy. This also sort of does the Cloverfield thing, with there already having been something on the tape, that occasionally pops up briefly when he stops recording for a while. That's all perfectly acceptable, if it does put the entire weight of carrying it on the shoulders of the actors, and of those, mainly Bohne. And that's where the real problem arises: None of these people are very good, convincing performers(the kid was by far the worst, then again, few children are that compelling, and they are typically considered OK if they can deliver lines and attempt to enunciate), and Bruce simply neither possesses the charisma or the talent to be the lead in a short anywhere near this long. This is only fifteen minutes, but with no real drama, horror or comedy(which they may have been going for here and there, though it's so vague that I can't be certain), you're gonna feel *every single second of it*. Yes, this does try to give back-story, flesh out "that gun store owner" we see in the film. If it didn't, there'd obviously be absolutely no justification for this at all. And it's still not that interesting. Heck, some of this takes away from the enjoyment of the movie, and one or two things may outright contradict it. At least this is pretty psychologically accurate. There is moderately frequent strong language in this, and disturbing content. I recommend this mainly to the biggest fans of the flick itself, and of this type of thing. 5/10

"SPOILER" When you watch the DVD you meet Andy who is alone on a the roof of his gun shop several blocks away from the Mall where the other survivors are staying. You get to know Andy through his relationship with Ken.The DVD extra fills out Andys character a little more.You see he was a family man, failing marriage, a father who loved his daughter and seemed like an all around nice guy who was all alone during the "end of the world".I thought Bruce Bohne did a good job and enjoyed the extra footage.

This supplement for the Dawn of the Dead DVD is pretty enjoyable. It's not supposed to be scary or frightening, it's supposed to be funny in a tongue-in-cheek sort of way. It's also interesting to watch if you liked the movie or if you like zombies in general. It's very amusing to watch Andy try different things to deter the zombies trying to get in or describing how he found out that headshots were fatal. Bruce Bohne as Andy is excellent. He seems like someone you could hang out and have a drink with, if the world wasn't being overrun by zombies, of course. The only part that I didn't really like was the intercut scenes of Andy's wife and his daughter. All in all, a great extra on the DVD.