Dead Snow / Død Snø (2009) – Horror Film Review

Tommy Wirkola’s Norwegian B-Movie Filled with Nazi Zombies

Oct 12, 2009

Nazi zombies screams b-movie horror fest. Tommy Wirkola's Dead Snow owes a heavy debt to many films, but the Nazi gimmick doesn't add much life to the gory homage.

What’s more terrifying than zombies? A group of Nazis? How about Nazi zombies? Dead Snow is director and screenwriter Tommy Wirkola’s homage-heavy splatter comedy, a wanna-be b-movie that delights in its references to other horror films.

Wirkola and co-screenwriter Stig Frode Henriksen obviously know and love movies. The script references and contains in-jokes about a number of horror films, including Sam Raimi’s Evil Dead movies and Peter Jackson’s Braindead (1992, released in the U.S. as Dead Alive, 1993).

A group of medical students travel to a cabin in Øksfjord, an isolated setting which establishes the movie’s debt to the slasher genre, and their presence awakens Nazi zombies. Sara (Ane Dahl Torp), the cabin’s owner, is dispatched in the film’s prologue. Seven potential victims remain: Sara’s boyfriend Vegard (Lasse Valdal), his friends Martin (Vegar Hoel), Roy (Henriksen), and Erland (Jeppe Laursen), who are joined by Martin’s girlfriend Hanna (Charlotte Frogner) and her friends Liv (Evy Kasseth Røsten) and Chris (Jenny Skavlan).

Any studied consideration of the plot is unnecessary and it’s better not to dwell on the movie’s explanation for the Nazis’ re-emergence. Both are convoluted. Getting to know the characters is also unnecessary. They are deliberate cardboard constructions meant to motivate the gory action.

Several characters are given mildly amusing scraps of dialogue, however, if not much development. Most fit the genre’s stereotypes, such as oversexed girl and undersexed nerd, and their behavior fits their roles. Most memorable is Erland (Laursen), a movie geek in a Braindead t-shirt, who points out the flaws in horror movies even as he’s caught in their clichés. It’s not too much of a stretch to suggest Erland stands in for the screenwriters themselves.

For all the premise’s appeal, Dead Snow’s Nazi zombies don’t quite work. Beyond offering another tiresome use of Nazis as popular culture’s shorthand for all things evil, the combination of monstrosities has no significance despite the script’s tortured attempt to provide one. It’s even questionable whether they are zombies rather than a more form of the undead.

Dead Snow, ultimately, is less a b-movie horror flick than a movie posing as one. It relies on audience awareness of its influences for impact. Its numerous references and clichés – the mysterious stranger, axes and chainsaws, disorienting chase scenes – can’t make up for a wearying sense of déjà vu. Even when the conventions are played for laughs, as they certainly are, there’s a laziness to Dead Snow that prevents it from being truly memorable.

More problematically, the movie’s use of b-movie conventions is erratic and reductive. Unlike Quentin Tarantino and Robert Rodriguez’s Grindhouse (2007), which also celebrated b-movie sensationalism, Dead Snow is poorly written and edited. Presumably, this was done as a send-up to b-movies because such moments are acknowledged within the film. Wirkola’s knowing wink at his film’s sloppiness, however, doesn’t excuses such weaknesses. It simply reminds one that Dead Snow is a pale imitation of the b-films it admires.

Dead Snow does demonstrate some technical strengths, notably its overall look. Norway’s wintery landscape makes for a striking canvas upon which buckets of blood are rather artfully captured by cinematographer Matt Weston. This is in keeping with films as diverse as Let the Right One In (2008) and Fargo (1996). Wirkola’s use of intestines, in what begs be called gut-wrenching action scenes, is inventive.

Despite its flaws, the movie’s last twenty minutes almost redeems it. The climax features the expected zombie-human showdown, but its tone becomes more consistent and its humor more grounded the actions of the surviving characters. Vegard and Martin, in particular, have strong moments in which they graphically demonstrate their medical knowledge. In these last minutes, Dead Snow becomes its own horror film.

Dead Snow is best approached as a minor addition to the zombie canon. Its pleasures are found in its eviscerations, beheadings, and bloody mayhem. Audience members primarily interested in zombies gore may enjoy its imaginative violence. Those who prefer a plot that’s slightly thicker than Dead Snow’s fake blood will want to seek out the films that inspired it.

The copyright of the article Dead Snow / Død Snø (2009) – Horror Film Review in B Movies is owned by Debra Peterson. Permission to republish Dead Snow / Død Snø (2009) – Horror Film Review in print or online must be granted by the author in writing.