Director(s) – Andreas Tom (Ghostfiles) and Achim Lutzelschwab
Starring – Stephen Weyte (Blood II: The Chosen), Sebastian Kettner, and Atlanta Luetzelschwab
Release Date – 2014
Rating – 3.5/5
Sometimes its hard for a film to set itself apart from other films especially zombie films released after 2010. I have seen so many zombie flicks over the years that claimed to reinvent the sub-genre but none have really reinvented the sub-genre as promised. I have, however, came across a few that are simply unique and offered up a new take on the undead menace.
A few weeks ago I saw a post in a horror group on Facebook regarding the film FPS: First Person Shooter. The film looked fun and rather unqique so I reached out to them and they were kind enough to send me a link to the online screener. The film looked fun and I really appreciate you guys for giving me a chance to check it out!
**Spoiler Alert**The film follows a man who is heading out to the local hospital to pick up his wife who is a nurse there. She did not return home from work the previous day and he is concerned for her well being. This just happened to take place with a viral outbreak that is bringing the dead back to life.
The man enters the building where he finds members of the undead in some of the rooms along with journal entries pointing to some dark and sinister exploits of the hospital doctor taking place in the basement involving the reanimated corpses. He continues his search for his lady all the way into the basement where the blood and guts get deep and he meets the savage doctor!**Spoiler Alert**
Some films have a great vision but they fail to transfer that vision to film while others are able to successfully turn their vision into the film they wanted. The team behind FPS had a vision for this film and that was to create a film similar to the classic video games of yesteryear like Doom andZero Tolerance. This was not the first time that a film was shot in first person view. In 2013 Necrostorm released their film Hotel Inferno and it was a fun one but FPS was the first full zombie film shot in first person and it resulted in one kick ass flick.
The acting in this is hard to judge. The film’s main antagonist rarely interacts with other characters and when he does we only have his hands in the scene. However, the other non-zombie character in the film does a great job at showing he is under danger. If this film was filmed any other way I would have believed he was in peril. Now, this film has an element I typically don’t judge and that is the voiceover. The film’s antagonist is hardly seen but always heard. His voiceover actor has one of the coolest voices I have ever heard and took me back to the 80s post-apocalyptic flicks like Mad Maxand such. It was amazing but his cheesy one-liners and movie quoting started to get old after 30 mins in and at about the hour mark I was ready to punch him myself. This needed to end early on in the film or spaced out to not over do it.
The story for this one is one we have seen before but never in the style of a retro video game. I absolutely loved this angle and believe the filmmakers pulled the look off. It gave us a story that we have seen before in a new light which is something other filmmakers should really do instead of delivery the same story the same way over and over again.
Finally, the film has a tremendous amount on screen kills culminating with a great degree of practical and visual effects. The practical effects are great and instead of using the visual effects to enhance the kills scenes only to fail like so many movies they used it to make the film look like a video game that inspired the film. Overall, FPS is a fantastic fucking film that is a roller coaster ride from start to finish. This film has to be watched!
