After Death is set on some remote Caribbean island where a team of scientists have decided to carry out experiments on curing all sorts of diseases using the local natives knowledge of Voodoo, unfortunately things go wrong & after accidentally killing the main Voodoo priests (James Sampson) child he open the gates of hell in order for the living dead to take revenge on the scientists. Jump forward twenty years & two group of people arrive on the island, some soldiers for hire & their girls & three backpackers who are there investigating the legends that surround the island. It's not long before both sets of travellers run into the living dead who are hungry for human flesh...
This Italian production was directed by Claudio Fragasso under the pseudonym of Clyde Anderson & one has to say it's pretty awful. Also known as Zombie Flesh Eaters 3 in the UK to cash in on the Lucio Fulci flick Zombi 2 (1979) which was called Zombie Flesh Eaters over here & After Death is more commonly known under the title Zombi 4: After Death pretty much everywhere else to cash in on Fulci's zombie flick which was called Zombi 2 everywhere else. But what about Zombi 3 (1988) I hear you all say? Well Zombi 3 was another Italian zombie flick credited to Fulci but doesn't have any connection to his Zombi 2 or this. Phew, got that? Good. Anyway, there's a general rule of thumb with regard to the Italian zombie film that the later it was made the worse it is & After Death proves that assumption rather nicely. Without wishing to get too technical After Death is awful in every regard. The script by Rossella Drudi makes no sense & feels more like a random collection of scenes than a proper coherent story. For instance at the start when the little girls mum tells her to run why does she stay behind to fight the zombie who was happily eating her husband & ignoring both of them? Woudn't her young daughter stood more of a chance with her? That also leads to the question who did a six year old girl manage to escape an isolated island in the middle of the sea? The very fact that the script then suggests she forgot what happened, found herself back on the island twenty years later by a coincidence complete with the amulet her mother gave her & then suddenly remembers everything! The character's are awful, the whole film is inconsistent with a scene of someone getting attacked by a zombie before they read from the Book of the Dead (very Evil Dead (1981)...) which what supposedly brings the dead back to life, some of the zombies can run, jump & know karate while others seem only able to shuffle along while one even manages to speak! After Death is rubbish, when a film is so poor & random it's impossible to care about anything or anyone.
Director Fragasso, sorry I mean Anderson doesn't do much to liven things up & After Death feels somewhat fragmented in the sense that it feels like several different zombie films edited together. There's lots of ugly wide shots, pans & zooms which gives it a cheap look & feel. There isn't much gore either, someone face is ripped off, a zombie puts it's hand through someone back & it exits through their chest, there's some bullet wounds, a few zombie bites & some fake blood but not much else. I mean there's nothing here to rival the splinter in the eye scene in Zombi 2 for instance & there isn't even any intestine eating. The whole thing is so poorly made & staged that it's impossible to take seriously & therefore it's not scary in the slightest.
Technically After Death is poor, shot on location in the Philippines it looks cheap & ugly throughout with poor special effects & some of the worst music ever. The main theme is awful & that living dead pop song left my ears aching. The acting is poor as well as is the dubbing. Jeff Stryker is better know as a gay hardcore sex film actor & the Don Wilson in the cast is definitely not Don 'The Dragon' Wilson (has been) action star!
After Death has nothing to do with any Fulci zombie flick & is retitled Zombi 4 purely to cash in on the success of the Fulci films, do yourself a favour & avoid this one as it's rubbish. This isn't even any good for laughs or over the top gore.
This Italian production was directed by Claudio Fragasso under the pseudonym of Clyde Anderson & one has to say it's pretty awful. Also known as Zombie Flesh Eaters 3 in the UK to cash in on the Lucio Fulci flick Zombi 2 (1979) which was called Zombie Flesh Eaters over here & After Death is more commonly known under the title Zombi 4: After Death pretty much everywhere else to cash in on Fulci's zombie flick which was called Zombi 2 everywhere else. But what about Zombi 3 (1988) I hear you all say? Well Zombi 3 was another Italian zombie flick credited to Fulci but doesn't have any connection to his Zombi 2 or this. Phew, got that? Good. Anyway, there's a general rule of thumb with regard to the Italian zombie film that the later it was made the worse it is & After Death proves that assumption rather nicely. Without wishing to get too technical After Death is awful in every regard. The script by Rossella Drudi makes no sense & feels more like a random collection of scenes than a proper coherent story. For instance at the start when the little girls mum tells her to run why does she stay behind to fight the zombie who was happily eating her husband & ignoring both of them? Woudn't her young daughter stood more of a chance with her? That also leads to the question who did a six year old girl manage to escape an isolated island in the middle of the sea? The very fact that the script then suggests she forgot what happened, found herself back on the island twenty years later by a coincidence complete with the amulet her mother gave her & then suddenly remembers everything! The character's are awful, the whole film is inconsistent with a scene of someone getting attacked by a zombie before they read from the Book of the Dead (very Evil Dead (1981)...) which what supposedly brings the dead back to life, some of the zombies can run, jump & know karate while others seem only able to shuffle along while one even manages to speak! After Death is rubbish, when a film is so poor & random it's impossible to care about anything or anyone.
Director Fragasso, sorry I mean Anderson doesn't do much to liven things up & After Death feels somewhat fragmented in the sense that it feels like several different zombie films edited together. There's lots of ugly wide shots, pans & zooms which gives it a cheap look & feel. There isn't much gore either, someone face is ripped off, a zombie puts it's hand through someone back & it exits through their chest, there's some bullet wounds, a few zombie bites & some fake blood but not much else. I mean there's nothing here to rival the splinter in the eye scene in Zombi 2 for instance & there isn't even any intestine eating. The whole thing is so poorly made & staged that it's impossible to take seriously & therefore it's not scary in the slightest.
Technically After Death is poor, shot on location in the Philippines it looks cheap & ugly throughout with poor special effects & some of the worst music ever. The main theme is awful & that living dead pop song left my ears aching. The acting is poor as well as is the dubbing. Jeff Stryker is better know as a gay hardcore sex film actor & the Don Wilson in the cast is definitely not Don 'The Dragon' Wilson (has been) action star!
After Death has nothing to do with any Fulci zombie flick & is retitled Zombi 4 purely to cash in on the success of the Fulci films, do yourself a favour & avoid this one as it's rubbish. This isn't even any good for laughs or over the top gore.