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Shadow: Dead Riot
USA 2006
produced by Csaba Bereczky, Carl Morano, John Sirabella (executive) for Fever Dreams
directed by Derek Wan
starring Carla Greene, Nina Hodoruk, Michael Quinlan, Cat Miller, Andrea Langi, Tony Todd, Tatianna Butler, Erin Brown (= Misty Mundae), Debbie Pingitore, Anna Curtis, Ruby Larocca, Danielle Riley, Sergio Jones, Gordon Joseph Weiss, Moet Meira, Aggie Valdez, Toy Lei, Captain Haggerty, S. William Hinzman, Brian Spears, Lee Burkett, Pete Gerner, Manny Colon, Gregory Smeck, John C.Murphy, Bill Morano, Sean Spanninger, Debbie D (cameo), Barbara Joyce (cameo)
story by Richard Siegel, screenplay by Michael Gingold, Richard Siegel, music by Vernon Reid, special effects by G & S Effects, special makeup effects by Allan Cooke, action coordinator: Tony Leung Siu Hung
review by Mike Haberfelner
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Available on DVD! To buy, click on link(s) below and help keep this site afloat (commissions earned) |
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20 years ago, serialkiller and rapist Shadow (Tony Todd) was executed,
but not before making a deal witht he devil - which inexplicably caused
his body to blow up upon dying from a lethal injection. Now: The place
where Shadow was executed has since become a women's prison, and tough
Solitaire( (Carla Greene) is the new kid on the block. But she soon makes
a name of herself when she defeats the prison's head bully Mondo (Tatianna
Butler), and eventually, Solitaire, your typical loner, even makes friends
with her pregnant cellmate Emily (Cat Miller). However, she also has
flashbacks to Shadow's murders, and it seems her own mother was one of his
victims. What nobody knows though is that the prison is a powderkeg
about to explode, since prison Doctor Swann (Michael Quinlan) is injecting
random inmates of the prison with a serum made from Shadow's blood,
including Mondo, Emily's baby once it's born and Solitaire. But while the
serum makes Solitaire almost supernaturally strong, it turns the others
into flesh-eating zombies ... which would be bad enough, but then Shadow -
who was buried on the prison's grounds - rises from the dead, and he
brings a zombie army with him ... and before you know it, pretty much
everyone gets killed by the zombies, everybody but Solitaire, who has a
(martial arts-)showdown with Shadow, during which she learns that he is
actually her father, but somehow, Shadow also gives away his secret about
how to be killed by a magic dagger left to Solitaire by her mother ... and
of course, Shadow is killed in the end. A blend of women in
prison- and zombie-cinema with (rather well executed) martial arts thrown
into the mix is something that at least sounds interesting - but
unfortunately, the finished product leaves much to be desired, mainly
because of a cliché-riddled and overly convoluted script that lacks
stringency, a directorial effort that seriously lacks atmosphere (not at
all helped by sets and costumes so colourful they make the women's prison
look like candyland), and a serious lack of charismatic actors and
actresses. That said, the film is not a total loss, it might work just
fine as a party movie, but it's far from the fun it could have been.
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