‘Atom the Amazing Zombie Killer’ Indie Horror Review

“Surely you must be crazy, to be watching such a crapola movie like this, crazy I tell you! And I must be crazy to, to be entertaining such scumbags!” – Areola, The Twilight Temptress of Terror

Let me start by saying, I used to love independent film. More than love, it was my mainstay. And then something happened…the majors started making their own “independent” companies, and made it a genre instead of something made by people, on their own, without a studio telling them what to do. And like all genres, it started sucking. Hard. The films became less labors of love, and more ways to make a quick buck. Next thing, we have Jennifer Lawrence and Bradley Whitford (no offense to either actor, as I find JL to be the best new actress of her generation, and BW to be top notch in most everything he’s in) getting acclaim for doing an “independent” film, directed by a big name director and financed by a huge corporation.

So, when I received this little film called Atom the Amazing Zombie Killer, I had mixed feelings. I was familiar with the filmmakers, Richard Taylor and Zack Beins (who co-directed the film, and co-wrote the screenplay with Tim Johnson), and their earlier short, The Misled Romance of Cannibal Girl and Incest Boy, which I found quite good. I had also met them at a film shoot in New York in the past, so I knew they had love for cinema, if nothing else. Still, I was uncertain what to expect, and a bit leery of what I would find.

I’m happy to report that all those feelings of apprehension were unnecessary: Atom the Amazing Zombie Killer quite simply blew me the hell away. I started it at 1:30 in the morning, thinking I would just watch the first half-hour or so to get a feel for it, and watch it in its entirety the next day. I never turned it off. I couldn’t. Between the hysterical fits of laughter, and feelings of incredulity regarding the insane death scenes, my eyes were glued to the screen.

One of my favorite things about this film was that it is truly independent. If you follow punk music at all, Atom is the equivalent of the attitude in the original punk era put to celluloid (err…high def video). That is, it blends high art and social commentary, with low art stalwarts, such as outlandish gore, boobs, and fart jokes. It is crazy, funny, bloody, and quite a bit shocking at times. It’s a hard slap in the face to everything wrong with modern-day Hollywood. This is not a film that will attract millions of the herd going to see Transformers. This is the film for people who are bored by it.