This well-received Sundance title has more going for it than just zombies and Nazis. After all, that's just a premise, a one-liner. To take that concept and turn it into the kind of Raimi-inspired gore-comedy that would make a roomful of fans and industry types practically stand up and cheer, well, that's a different matter—but that's exactly what happened recently at Fangoria's "Weekend of Horrors" in New York.

A good sign right off the bat: the Norwegian-made-and-set film starts with Edvard Grieg's classic “In the Hall of the Mountain King,” and though opening with a gratuitous kill-scene is more than a cliché, the crisp editing and witty use of the music invest the sequence with a sense of ghoulish delight. The rest of the film has other forms of polish on display, from its awesome "beauty shots" of the local scenery and its snappy metal-pop soundtrack, to its very solid  comedic performances. In fact, one of the many things that's worth admiring about the film is how well it uses its budget: Dead Snow has the élan of an inspired shoestring project but then surprises you with, for example, vistas right out of Cliffhanger—a best-of-both-worlds scenario.

Sure, the unfolding of the narrative is done in extremely familiar ways, but rather than trying to fight against this tendency, director Tommy Wirkola embraces it and creates a kind of horror comfort food in the process. Indeed, as the group of medical students heads to a remote cabin way up in the mountains above fjord country, one of them even remarks on how so many horror flicks start in precisely this manner. This same character, Erland (Jeppe Laursen), also happens to be an Evil Dead fan, and that's just the first of Dead Snow’s explicit nods to Sam Raimi. There are not only some pull-back shots through a cabin window with frightened folks looking outside at "us" that are reminiscent of classic Evil Dead moments, but also a highly recognizable tone of uninhibited, violence-based humor overall. Yes, there are Nazi zombies and there is a small bit of backstory to them, but really they are simply the catalyst for some striking visuals (the lead bad guy in particular) and outrageous gore-driven sight gags. Similarly, Raimi used the Lovecraftian Necronomicon angle pretty much to give himself free rein to construct whatever he wanted using the remote setting, the cast's willingness to be abused in order to amuse, and his own wild imagination. Swap in “transforming-into-zombie” for “demonic possession” and add a foot or two of hard-packed snow to everything and you'll have a sense of how Wirkola and co-writer Stig Frode Henriksen have updated, and migrated, a couple of American milestones from the ‘80s to a different setting but managed to preserve much of the fun.

No, Dead Snow is hardly flawless—there are some telegraphed shots as well as plot points, and the final moments feel a little tired—but for every minor misstep, there are two or three welcome surprises. Some fall under the heading of absurdist gore effects and some involve exciting action scenes while others simply spring unexpected developments in terms of characterization at us (including a sex scene that was so surreal that at first I thought it was a dream sequence). The "smart zombie" approach—they use tools, have a chain of command—may cause some Romero-purists to bristle and make even casual viewers question some narrative logic. Still, if you switch your brain to popcorn mode, you'll settle in nicely for the crazed ride. My recommendation for watching this cold blast of summer entertainment: wherever you end up catching Dead Snow, try to make sure the a/c is turned up, way up.    
 
source (for release dates): Fangoria