Writer: Christian Piers Betley
Director: Lowell Dean
13 Eerie has a group of six forensic students on an overnight field exam. This takes place on (of course) an isolated island that used to be a prison. More than that, there were rumours that the place was used for medical experiments on death row prisoners. When the pot smoking bus driver accidentally spills a container of strange chemical gunk then it’s only a matter of time before the dead prisoners start coming back to life.
OK, it’s nonsense. But it could still have been good fun and the location is undeniably interesting. I was also interested to see what twists having forensic students involved with walking cadavers would bring. I was hoping for some sort of “CSI Zombie”. Unfortunately the result is a million miles from that and fails on several levels.
The main problem for me was the total lack of tension or fear. Lowell Dean’s direction is pedestrian and uninspired. Instead of suspense he concentrates more on the action and the gore, so we get close up detailed shots of students being slowly eaten by corpses in orange jumpsuits. Which, for me, is neither interesting nor scary.
Perhaps to make up for this Dean adopts a slightly shaky camera which is simply irritating. The over-the-top music also serves to reduce what little atmosphere there is rather than add to it. The actors perform decently, but there’s not much they can do and I couldn’t even remember the students’ names, let alone care about them. The script leaves most of the important questions unanswered. It also makes no use of the potential of having forensic students involved in a zombie uprising, they could be any group of generic Young People.
If all you want is a lot of running about and some close up gore then 13 Eerie will appeal to you. If you’re looking for anything deeper or more interesting, you’ll be disappointed.