Mother of gore

Peter Jackson’s 1992 zombie horror Braindead — released as Dead Alive in the United States — is, according to the Tri-City Herald’s Ed Robertson, “unless someone has video of the Normandy invasion lying around, the goriest movie of all time.” “Far from mindless, its violence is spectacularly funny and joyously creative. The average horror flick would build its big finale around a scene as inventive as the bowel-zombie, the kung fu preacher, or the grotesque claymation rat-monkey. Jackson skips from gag to gag like it’s nothing, treating each outrageous death like it’s the last one he’ll have the chance to film. A slapstick horror masterpiece, Dead Alive is the work of a man who’d reached the top of his game before the studios caught on. Snag the unrated version, and witness the lawnmower massacre in all its uncut glory.”