Hibernian Horror: 'Dead Meat'

Back in March I did a blog post highlighting the top 10 Irish horror films, in celebration of St. Patrick's Day. Ireland's not a country that's as heavily associated with the genre as the likes of America or the UK, but if you look hard enough there are a surprising number of gems scattered throughout our countries filmography. I felt like in that post I couldn't really go too in-depth on each individual film, so now I've decided to a fortnightly series where I will look at a different individual film each week. This will be the first entry to this series, where I look at the Leitrim-set zombie horror Dead Meat.

Dead Meat is a 2004 zombie film written and directed by Conor McMahon that sees a zombie virus spread through rural Leitrim due to a mutant strain of mad-cow disease. Spanish actress Marian Araujo stars as a tourist who gets caught up in the carnage, while her grave-digging companion is portrayed by David Muyllaert (who also sings the films theme-song). The film was greenlit by the Irish Film Board under a microbudget funding scheme that was targeted at independent filmmakers. Subsequently McMahon shot the film for a budget of €110,000, which feels like small-change when you compare it to standard film budgets. Ultimately Dead Meat proved that you could actually do a lot with very little, and to me is a highly entertaining Irish zombie romp.

The film begins with Spanish tourist Helena (Araujo) and her partner driving through the Irish countryside before picking up a roadside hitcher á la Texas Chainsaw Massacre.  The hitcher (played by Ned Dennehy who has since starred in the likes of Game of Thrones and Mandy) winds up being infected however, and thus kickstarts the events that follow. Helena soon allies herself with local gravedigger Desmond (Muyllaert), a shovel-wielding zombie slayer who is more than a match for the undead. The duo then begin their travels across rural Leitrim, encountering a variety of dead and living folk along the way. It sounds formulaic, but Dead Meat is a very dynamic film that constantly progresses at a satisfying pace. Every zombie encounter feels like it has stakes, and the film never manages to come off as sluggish.

Writer/director Conor McMahon takes clear inspiration from Sam Raimi's Evil Dead franchise, both in his direction and the films tone itself. Swooping camerawork that feels almost POV-like dominates the film, but it's the balance maintained between hardcore gore and tongue-in-cheek humor that really makes this feel like a Raimi-homage. An early scene sees Helena face off against a zombie in an abandoned home, using a vaccum cleaner to suck out the ghouls eyeball. It's gnarly, but there's just something so creative and funny about using a hoover to kill a zombie, especially using it that way. But it's not just one big homage however, as Dead Meat finds its own unique sense of personality as things progress. The film later returns to its mad-cow-disease concept in a scene that pits our protagonists against a zombified cow, who terrorises them from outside their vehicle. Sure, there are echoes of Peter Jackson and Sam Raimi, but McMahon does manage to find his own voice and present a zombie film that is uniquely Irish.

Speaking of which, I have yet to talk about the films own unsung hero Cathal (Eoin Whelan). Cathal meets our main duo about halfway through the film, along with a couple of other survivors. Clad in a jumper and flat cap, with his trusty hurl in hand, Cathal is almost like a modern day Cú Chullain who slays zombies instead of vicious dogs. In one of the films most hilarious scenes, Cathal reaches out of his moving car, hurl in hand, and flat out decapitates a zombie. I don't know about you, but there's just something incredibly surreal about a man using a hurl as a weapon against a zombie, and its moments like this that make Dead Meat feel uniquely Irish. It's almost like Father Ted or the Barrytown trilogy with zombies, in the sense that the brand of humor will appeal primarily to Irish people themselves. However, the sense of homage and impressive practical effects allow the film to have a much wider appeal.

For a film with such a low budget I have to say the effects are fairly impressive. While the visual quality or sound quality can feel a bit grainy at times, I feel the effects definitely make up for this and always feel very high-standard for a film with such a low budget. From the aforementioned eyeball scene, to the previous image of the zombie with the shovel in its head,  There's one particular scene that I remember, in which this hag-like zombie is attacking Helena and it gets very gory, I'm talking Lucio Fulci level gory. The sequence never feels hammy or fake, but its actually quite gnarly and stomach-turning. McMahon and his crew definitely put a lot of effort and care into the practical effects and it really shows by the end of it all.

I won't spoil the ending, but as the film reaches its climactic moments our survivors are forced into this ancient castle where they must face off against hordes of the undead, making for a fittingly macabre finale.

Dead Meat received a very limited release and has since faded into obscurity, bare in mind that Shaun of the Dead was also released in 2004, so it was a hard film to go up against. But if you're an Irish horror fan, or just a fan of film in general, then it's definitely worth a watch. For a film with such a minimal budget it manages to rise above this obstacle with its practical effects and tongue-in-cheek humour. If you've ever wanted to see a zombie cow or, even better, a zombie being decapitated with a hurl, then this is the film for you. As for Conor McMahon, he has since worked as a director and editor on a number of small projects, but his most notable work is the Irish comedy-horror Stitches that came out in 2012. However, that is for another week.