The Thai film Zombie Soldier also goes by the title Keep Running. Zombie Soldier!, which is a much more apt title. Much like Scooby Doo and Shaggy, the young military men in this zombedy spend the entire time running and screaming from ghouls. It’s also not unlike the Thai film Make Me Shudder, which I blog about here.
What is it with Thai horror comedies featuring groups of running and screaming young men? Just as in Make Me Shudder, the comic value runs dry pretty fast, but Zombie Soldier delivers plenty of other weird and wacky humor to offset the shrill sound of squealing boys. In fact, much of the visual and physical comedy is like something out of The Benny Hill Show, complete with running scenes in fast forward mode.
The plot is straightforward: while camped out in the woods, young military men sit around a campfire telling tales of a young soldier killed by his lieutenant in the same location. Minutes later, they begin seeing the zombie “ghosts” of both the soldier and the lieutenant, and are then terrorized for most of the movie before they learn what the (cool looking) zombies want from them.
More entertaining than the two zombies is the quirky, campy tone of the film. While this isn’t a “gay” horror comedy…this is totally a gay horror comedy that transcends my die, gay guy, die! page and is going on my homo horror movie page instead. So I’m going to break down just how gay it is (aka: Big Gay Spoilers).
- One of the young soldiers is openly flamboyant and gay.
- We see two hot, muscular soldiers in their tents, and they appear to be having sweaty, hard butt sex.
Turns out they aren’t, but they do agree to pluck the nipple hairs from around each other’s nipples. - In a flashback, a drag queen leads the soldiers in a very sexy boy band dance.
At various times throughout the movie, even in the heat of the zombie scares, the boys will suddenly bust out these boy band moves.
- When three soldiers go into the woods for a bathroom break, one soldier checks out the penis of the other as they pee—and compliments him on the size.
- There’s a “shower” scene in which the soldiers are actually in their underwear and just splashing their bodies with water from rows of sinks.
However, they all stop and watch, enraptured, as one stud steps in, drops his towel to reveal his tighty-whities, and breaks into a sexy dance.
They all cheer, and the gay guy—now wearing a flower in his hair—gushes (verbally).
The soldier in front of him intentionally drops the soap, bends to pick it up, and purposely begins to rub his ass on the gay boy’s crotch.
The gay boy gets highly offended—because he’s not a top!
- During this same shower scene, a partial drag trio comes in and totally camps it up.
- When caught in the midst of all the shower shenanigans, the soldiers are forced to do pushups…
…resulting in a human centipede situation. - The drag trio sneaks into a soldier’s tent and begins feeling him up…
- The gay guy fantasizes about being rescued by another strapping young soldier.
- The guy who dropped the soap finally takes the gay guy’s hand and admits that he loves him, and all the other soldiers cheer. However, the gay guy rejects the advance because, well, he’s not exactly himself at the moment….
Sure, there are only two zombies in the entire film, but they are two cool ghouls. Plus, Zombie Soldier features the charm and slapstick scares of Abbott & Costello meeting the classic movie monsters, is loaded with campy homo horror humor, is playfully homoerotic, and is packed with cute, shirtless guys.
