Redneck Zombies is an infamous cult classic from the late 80s. It’s deliciously low-budget direct-to-VHS crap! Surprisingly, it’s not as comically over-the-top as I’d expected, but it definitely has its campy moments and plenty of gross outs. The real draw is the nasty zombie effects, which are pretty damn good.
The plot is simple. A big burly army dude is transporting this barrel of toxic waste that falls off his jeep. A fat redneck drives him away at gunpoint and then a group of backwoods buffoons makes moonshine out of the green shit in the barrel. Meanwhile, there’s a group of city folk hiking and camping out in the woods.
Rednecks start turning into zombies with nasty gunk plastered on their faces, and they do some serious gut-munching. There’s a white trash lady with an adorable, uninterested baby pig that totally upstages her. Then there’s this dude in a pickup truck who sells chewing tobacco—he wears a bag over his head and speaks in a demonic voice. WTF? He also looks less than human under his mask….
Naturally, since this is a Troma film, there’s offensive and “controversial” stuff: sperm drinking talk, fart humor, redneck thoughts of necrophilia, completely gratuitous scenes of a woman playing with her oiled-up breasts, trippy weed smoking scenes, and children and baby zombies feasting on flesh.
There are also two ridiculously stereotypical characters. There’s a black dude who becomes a quivering, bumbling fool talking all high-pitched like a girl—but he lapses into some funny Wizard of Oz impersonations.
And a completely flaming army dude wears a red bandana around his neck and has a wrist so limp it looks like it needs a cast. But he does have two funny lines about Deliverance and water sports. Of course, the butt-munch gets gut-munched.
The big treat for me was not one, but TWO bearded bears! One is the burly leader of the hitchhikers (in some tight-assed jeans). The other is a dumb redneck in nothing but jeans and a vest. I wish there would have been a scene of him playing with his well-oiled breasts. 80s bears are the best!
The gore is really great in Redneck Zombies, although it takes virtually 45 minutes for the first good zombie action and the full horde doesn’t come into play until the last half hour. The hikers discover the way to kill a zombie is with deodorant! Remember—it’s a Troma film—which would explain why one of the last scenes involves the final girl being sexually assaulted by a big fat redneck zombie.
If you were wondering if you should see this one, that last bit of trivia should decide you either way….
