Creatures of War #9: Bunker of the Dead (2015)
Video-game movies and the death of Ryan Reynolds humor
Title Sequence
Hello again. No long-winded personal tales today (aka I feel like I should compartmentalize my work-life like a serial killer in order to stay sane), just an analysis of this bad movie. I found Bunker of the Dead on Tubi (where all nazi-zombie movies go to die) and thought “No way this is even a little good”. I was mostly right, but I’m going to talk about it anyway.
Review
Two friends decide to infiltrate an old German bunker to discover lost gold. Markus goes underground solo to find the gold while Thomas guides him with a radio. Markus finds himself in trouble when the (US??) military follows him into the bunker. Oh, and there are nazi-zombies and aliens out to get him.
This is clearly a German movie, but it’s inexplicably poorly dubbed over with English. Maybe that’s just the version I saw, but it’s hard to imagine there are multiple versions of this film floating around. Bunker of the Dead is shot found-footage style and while I used to be a hater of the technique, I’m quickly learning that low-budget movies like this really thrive on the gimmick.
The acting is poor, the movie is kinda ugly, the plot is full of holes, and the effects are nothing special, but I’ll give credit where credit is due, this movie has a vision. This is maybe the most stylistically video-game-like movie I’ve ever seen, and it’s not even a video-game movie. The found-footage aspect gives the audience a first-person shooter view that I thought worked really well. Every time Markus found a new weapon he would hold it up in a way that I could almost hear the “new weapon acquired” notification. The fight choreography was fun, and if there were little health and stamina bars in the corner of the screen they wouldn’t have been out of place. There even seemed to be levels, complete with a very silly boss fight at the end. I love the aesthetic the filmmakers decided to go for, even if they were limited by their money and talent. I want to see what would happen if someone gave these guys 50 million and just let them run with it. But then again, that’s just Resident Evil, right?
Bunker of the Dead is objectively a bad movie, but there’s something really fun under the surface that I wish was brought forward.
But is it funny?
Bunker of the Dead is mostly supposed to be a comedy. I can look past the low budget and bad acting, but I cannot ignore that it’s just not funny. Sure I chuckled once or twice, but as the movie wore on the jokes really started to bother me.
Deadpool is the first example that I can remember with the kind of humor this movie has. Endless one-liners, over-the-top sarcasm, self-deprecation, and a little crude. I enjoyed Deadpool when it first came out, but I’ll admit I don’t find it funny anymore. There’s something childish about the jokes that no longer makes me giggle. Don’t get me wrong I’m no snob and I’m certainly not very funny (my favorite jokes to this day are still random Vines), but comedy has moved on! Humor can be fleeting like fashion or media trends, and I just think this Ryan Reynolds comedy is falling out of favor. Of course, humor is subjective, and with recent movies like Free Guy1 and the new Deadpool and Wolverine, obviously this humor still hits for a lot of people. I have just noticed an uptick in criticism of Deadpool-like humor in recent years and know I’m not completely alone in my fatigue.
I can’t fully blame Ryan Reynolds for Bunker of the Dead though. Deadpool came out in 2016 and this was ahead of the curve in 2015. Also, some of the jokes in Bunker of the Dead are so misogynistic that I almost turned it off, I’d like to think Ryan Reynolds would never.
Somewhere out there I’m sure a 13-year-old German boy thinks this is the funniest movie in the world, but I’m just not the intended audience.
End Credits
Maybe Bunker of the Dead is an unfunny strange mess, but... no maybe it’s just an unfunny strange mess. I respect the vision, but I wouldn’t recommend it.
Bonus
If you want to double-feature this, here’s what I’d do:
Hardcore Henry (2015) I haven’t seen this but it’s got a similar gimmick
Troll Hunter (2010)
Black Sheep (2006)
Extra:
Some movies I watched recently that I’d recommend (I’ve been on an 80s kick clearly):
Brain Damage (1988)
The Omen (1976)
A Nightmare on Elm Street 4 (1988)
I did enjoy Free Guy though! Didn’t love it, but the soundtrack is so good.