This movie gives a whole new meaning to the term “lucky stiff”. The plot opens with George Dubya obtaining a fourth term and the Iraq War spilling over into France, Canada and Alaska. With the surplus of soldiers rapidly decreasing a research team comes up with a serum that reanimates dead tissue. Recyclable soldiers? Now, there’s a concept.

A Special Forces team is sent in to dispose of the failed test subjects but one of their own gets bit by one of the zombie rejects, flees and ends up hiding out in an underground strip club. It’s only a matter of time before the infected soldier passes on the virus to the dancers and patrons of the Rhino Club. What’s an undead exotic dancer to do? Why, keep on dancing, of course! And when the ghoulish girls start bringing in more moolah the club owner decides that high profits far outweigh public safety.

When I rented Zombie Strippers I was so certain of what to expect: lots of nudity and silly acting slathered with a thick glaze of fake blood. Color me pleasantly surprised to tell the world that I loved Zombie Strippers!

This movie actually has more going for it than the obvious. It takes place in a gentlemen’s club so of course you’re going to get a lot of T&A. Oh and the gore is plentiful also. The "Zombie" part of the title delivers on the flesh eating, bloody wounds, and decomposing flesh. Horror purists will go gah-gah over the slick makeup effects. One highly impressive scene involves a dancer named Lilith (Roxy Saint) giving a “john” a jaw dropping private dance.

The shock is that the movie really does have some substance and wit to it. The dancers, for example, run around spouting philosophical lines about the meaning of life, using big words like “existentialism” and reading stuff by Nietzsche. It was a sweet twist on the dumb exotic dancer image. Actually, the guys behind parody flicks such as Epic Movie and Meet The Spartans should watch this flick to remind themselves how good humor is really done. Hot topics include immigration, The Bush Administration, religion, The NRA, the correct phylum of the clam and probably some others that flew over my head. The dialogue is so much fun thanks to the characters constantly going into overblown soliloquies and rampant psychobabble.

Zombie Strippers also achieves something that horror movies rarely deliver: memorable characters. The movie opens with the zombie strike force that consists of the usual hardened soldiers who drink pee-pee for breakfast but their quirky personalities keep them from being passively typical. My favorite soldier was Sassy Sue (Laura Bach) who could pass as a stripper herself but her life’s path had her learning how to operate heavy firearms in the field of battle. Lt. Ryker (Jen Alex Gonzalez) is a compact woman of focused aggression and the perfect partner for her equally tough-as-steel superior Major Camus (Catero Colbert). Oxnard (Travis Wood) is just fun to look at with nice sized “guns” to go with his, um, actual guns. Then there’s Kwan (Jessica Custodio) who is just as adept at martial arts as she is at communications equipment.

The Rhino boasts even more outrageous people. There’s Ian Essko (Robert Englund), the owner who loves making money but is so afraid of catching some disease from his employees that he carries around a can of Lysol to keep himself sanitized. There’s no shock that Englund is a delight as the sleazy yet nutty club owner. Madame Blavatski (Carmit Levite) is a veteran stripper from some throwback European heckhole but by her accent I swear she was from the east side of Transylvania. Blavatski is a hoot when she starts telling stories about the old country. Think Rose Nylund telling St. Olav yarns in a Natasha Fatale accent.

Poor Paco (Joey Medina) gets smacked with a lot of crap not only because he’s the custodian on the premises but also receives mucho immigration jabs from his boss, Ian. One of Paco’s best lines is “Badgers? Badgers! We don’t need no stinkin’ badgers!” Cole the emcee (Calvin Green) is one of the few voices of reason and sanity in this crazy situation but the best he can do is try to keep his girls safe and keep as much blood off the stage as possible.

The dancers are a blast. Jenna Jameson leads the troupe as the diva dancer “Kat”. Jeannie (Shamron Moore) is her bitter rival who longs to steal the spotlight from the reigning pole queen. Gaia (Whitney Anderson) is also not a fan of Kat and usually sides with Jeannie. Goth chick Lilith (Roxy Saint) looks up to Kat while resident “brick house” Bobby Sox (Penny Drake) adores Kat a little too much. Poor Berenge (Jeannette Sousa) is just trying to make sense of it all; her life, her identity, competing with rotting corpses, and feeling accepted. New girl Jessie (Jennifer Holland) is fresh from the Bible Belt and is ready to strip to pay for her ailing Nana’s medical bills despite her sanctified upbringing. Her friend Davis (John Hawkes) trails along behind her in the hopes of protecting his lady love from danger.

Yes, this movie features adult film goddess Jenna Jameson and I applaud the filmmakers for not only choosing her for this feature but also for putting her in a prominent role. One of my personal soapbox issues is how Hollywood shuns adult film actors. I mean talk about calling the kettle black. The only difference I can see between porn scenes and sex scenes performed in mainstream films is that Hollywood doesn’t show “Slot A” being inserted into “Slot B”. I love Halle Berry but let’s keep it real. Her Oscar winning performance in Monster’s Ball included some soft porn scenes that even made me blush and with my complexion that’s a major accomplishment. I could go on and on about it but I applaud actors like Jameson who have managed to cross “the border” into mainstream film. Plus, Jameson is great not only in the dance scenes but also with the line delivery and makeup effects.

According to the Behind the Scenes featurette, most of the main characters and plot are loosely adapted from a 1959 play called Rhinoceros by Eugene Ionesco. The other mini-doc discusses the make-up processes required to create some fine looking undead peoples. Zombie Strippers also includes some entertaining deleted and extended scenes. I watched them all and loved them as much as the kept scenes.

I really am in shock at how much I enjoyed Zombie Strippers. What should have been a vapid splatterfilm turned out to be clever and comical romp that might bring a tear to John Waters’ eye (or a rueful glare because he didn’t think of it first). This is one of those guilty pleasure flicks I’m gonna buy and show to all my friends.
 
http://www.sonypictures.com/homevideo/zombiestrippers/