Mimesis (2011) – Review – Is It Worth Spilling Blood Over?

Yell! Magazine’s review of Mimesis:

Mimesis tells the story of a group of people who get to live a horror movie, namely Night of the Living Dead. While the concept is great in theory, I feel that it was poorly executed in the film.

Our group of unwitting participants are so-called horror fans, most of them, who were recruited (i.e., invited to an exclusive party) while attending a horror convention. While at the party, they are drugged and wake up in different clothes. We learn pretty quickly by the makeup that these zombies aren’t real, but they really do kill. Later, we learn that the whole operation is run by a few thrill seekers and that Mimesis is essentially torture porn. This doesn’t work for me for two reasons:

1. Torture porn doesn’t parallel Night of the Living Dead

2. It’s not what the trailers led me to believe. Meaning that I was expecting these partygoers to stumble upon a portal or magical puzzle box (a la Hellraiser) that would transport them into an actual parallel universe that made their favorite horror movie a reality. If that were the case, I guess half the film would have had to be shown in black and white.

Also, these horror fans took forever to realize what movie they were participating in. You would expect Russell (Taylor Piedmonte), our most sympathetic and horror-entrenched character, to get it as soon as he woke up in the cemetery with Karen as Barbara (Jana Thompson). It’s unfortunate that Russell met his demise so early in the film, as he’s easily the only likeable character… but so is not the way of Night of the Living Dead.

One of the most unbelievable aspects of Mimesis was the role-playing zombies. Did the filmmakers really expect us to believe that these scrawny guys, acting slow and lumbering like “real” zombies, could so easily overpower such an athletic looking cast of 20-somethings? All the psychopathic preplanning in the world wouldn’t help these guys overpower, much less catch, one of their victims if they remained in character.

As far as casting goes, Director Douglas Schulze did a pretty good job. Most notable is Gavin Grazer’s portrayal of Cooper, excellent and totally unlikeable, and Jana Thompson’s Barbara, totally lost and bewildered.

Another noticeable fault in the Mimesis was the sound. I watched this on Blu-ray, but the quality just wasn’t there. At times you couldn’t hear the dialog over the score, and at other times the echo told you that they were on set somewhere.

The Verdict: [rating:2]

There’s so much wrong with Mimesis. The concept is great, fantastic even, but it was just poorly executed. What could have been a great homage to a great film has just ended up being a remake of Night of the Living Dead without being a remake. I’m giving this film a 2 because the only people who will appreciate it are Romero fans. I use the term “appreciate” loosely.

Rock Hard \m/