Night of the Comet (1984)

1984’s Night of the Comet is a campy post-apocalyptic horror film set after a comet passes close to earth irradiating everyone into a red dust and turning other survivors into intelligent zombies, except for a chosen few who are immune to the comet’s effects. Regina and Samantha are two of these survivors, and are left wandering a abandoned California battling the undead and a group of evil scientists who want to harvest their blood and manufacture a cure.

Of course since Regina and Samantha’s father is a trained special forces operative fighting the commies in Honduras (thanks Reagan!) the girls are expertly trained in combat and the use of firearms. One character puts it humorously “The Mac-10 was practically designed for housewives.” Night of the Comet is essentially a female’s take on the apocalypse as the two sisters get to indulge in responsibility free shopping sprees at the mall, fight over the only remaining male hunk, and fight the occasional zombie.

I do say occasional, because the zombies are a bit few and far between in this film. Most of the conflict of the film comes from a group of scientists attempting to harvest the girls, and a lot of the film is actually pretty slow as the characters explore an abandoned L.A. We seen most of this before in Romero’s films, and most of the attempts at humor do fall a bit flat. But, like Romero’s films there does seem to be a touch of social commentary and parody here, especially in the ending which seems to say that maybe civilization isn’t much better than the apocalypse.

All in all though, Night of the Comet is a bit on the forgettable side.

4/10