Rabid - Not bad, but not all good

Being a David Cronenberg fan, I was really looking forward to seeing ‘Rabid.’ Granted I’ve left it a bit late, watching it after pretty much all his other films.  And perhaps that was the wrong way to do it.  Basically, I preferred his other stuff.  Although that’s not to say that Rabid isn’t without its shades of goodness.

It’s a zombie film.  Nothing new there these days, but, in the seventies, the undead were still a rarity.  Okay, so the purists will shout how these ‘zombies’ aren’t really zombies, but, like with films such as ’28 Days Later’ the principal is the same, i.e. you get bitten, you turn into one.  Here, a young woman suffers a horrific motorcycle accident and, during the experimental surgery to save her, she contracts a disease (much like rabies) which makes her hungry to bite people (albeit with a weird extra spike protruding from her – you’ll have to watch the film to see what I mean by that, as it’s a little hard to describe!).

Basically, it’s a slow burner.  Don’t expect any ‘Dawn of the Dead’ type action sequences to move it along.  The first half was actually a little too slow for my liking, but I am glad I stuck with it, as the true ‘horror’ of the situation is cranked up in the second act.  You actually get some pretty hard hitting scenes that are quite bleak and nasty if you’re prepared to wait for them, as the authorities find the disease pretty hard to contain.

All performances are functional.  None of the actors really stand out too much.  You’ll have to remember that it was the seventies when this was made, so ‘attractiveness’ wasn’t high up on the list of requisites for male acting leads.  The actress at the centre of it all – if you believe the trivia surrounding the film – was picked due to her good looks over other actresses deemed better at their trade, but lacking in the ‘bombshell’ qualities.

So, if you’re looking for a slow-burning blast-from-the-past with a decent amount of gore and creepiness in the latter stages, give this a go.  Personally, I preferred Cronenberg’s Shivers, Videodrome, Scanners and The Fly, but I didn’t regret at least seeing Rabid.

6/10 Should probably keep you awake if Freddy Krueger was haunting your nights