A deranged horror trip about a quest for revenge set amongst the advent of an apocalypse offers an intense dive into discomfort in the typically unhinged style of genre films from down under. Banned in several countries, while becoming a cult hit on the Japanese VHS market, Death Warmed Up fully delivers in the department of fierce unconventionality, frenetic nightmarishness and frenzied form.
At its core, this is a tale of a mad scientist who desires to rid humanity of the curse of mortality. Blinded by this vision, he resorts to very unethical practices and untested procedures, which begin to show unfortunate side effects. However, instead of the megalomaniacal scientist, the filmmakers focus on the characters of his victims and henchmen, showing the events from their perspectives obscured by insatiable agony and bloodthirsty rage.
Like screenwriter Michael Heath’s previous work, the Australian giallo Next of Kin (1982), Death Warmed Up deliberately forgoes narrative coherence. It plunges headlong into a wonderfully disturbing atmosphere and gradual disarray, where rationality shatters into bestial madness. Director David Blyth fully embraced unconventionality and imbued his masterpiece with an apocalyptic destruction of all certainties, which is reflected in the constant nervousness of the characters, but also in the suggestive camerawork of James Bartle, who also shot The Quiet Earth (1985).
