On a rewatch, I found myself enjoying this one a little bit more than last time. Its a very easy watch in its own way…a very simple premise, some basic, but vaguely developed characters, the soundtracks a bit generic, but isnt offensive…

The first two acts are pretty smooth, though they do have a vague heir of ‘Made for TV’ about them, not helped by the fact the gore is so minimal and the zombies doing much of ANYTHING really is kind of a rare treat. But I think where this film really fell down for me is the 3rd act…the moment Joseph and Jeff agree to go into the woods to track down the escaped zombies, the film essentially goes WELL into padding terratory for most of the remaining 35 minutes…and it never really comes back from it.

Everything slows to a glacial pace, we end up in a series of runarounds, and while there are a couple of fun ideas here put into practice, it isnt enough to ultimately win me back over and while the ACTUAL ending is just about fine enough, the total waste of 30 minutes to get it really hurts this film in my opionion.

I had remembered this film looking and feeling a LOT more low/no budget than it actually is, it still doesnt look GREAT, but it does on the whole look pretty good! theres some really nice lighting and blue gel colour use. I think setting a third of the film in the woods with ultra basic camera setups and little to no props right up to about 5-10 minutes off the end is what left me with that long lasting feeling.

On the whole? on a rewatch, I actually enjoyed this one more. But if anything it really did reinforce some of the problems that I had with it previously. Definitely an easy watch if you just want something to half pay attention to rumbling away in the background while your doing something else…I dont personally think i’d instinctively reach for this one in that specific circumstance…but your milage may vary.

source https://letterboxd.com/tytdreviews/film/the-video-dead/1/