Wicked Little Things (aka "Zombies") (R)
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I watched this on Sci-Fi Channel. Um, what to say? The film starts with a scene of a mine some years ago, I don't really know when exactly. But there were some kids working in the mine, and they got killed in a cave in after planting dynamite, or whatever. It seemed quite unnecessary, but it was allowed, or rather caused, by someone for no apparent reason (other than to set up the plot). Then we flash forward to the present, when a recently widowed woman named Karen Tunny is moving with her daughters, Sarah and Emma (Chloe Moretz) to a house they inherited. It was like the old family home of her late husband, who never talked about his childhood. The place is pretty run down. In fact the movie is very dark, and even once they get the electricity working, the house isn't well lit. And the plumbing doesn't work well. Unlike most such movies, the unreliability of the utilities seems pretty mundane and unrelated to the supernatural stuff that occurs.

Yes, of course, the kids who died in the mine come back as zombies. And of course one of them, a girl named Mary, befriends Emma, though Karen assumes her daughter's talk of Mary is of an imaginary friend. Meanwhile, Sarah starts hanging out with a few kids her age from the local small town not far from their isolated old house. And there's a guy named Mr. Hanks, who tries to warn Karen about the danger, but of course he just seems crazy and creepy. And there's a guy named Mr. Carlton who is descended from the guy who used to own everything in the area (and who presumably caused the mining accident I guess), and now this descendant is buying up everything again with development plans. Wants to build a ski resort or some such nonsense.

The zombie children want revenge against pretty much anyone not of their own bloodlines. And two of them were Tunnys, which means they're related by blood to Sarah and Emma, but not to Karen (only a Tunny by marriage, obviously). Still, even the family blood won't necessarily keep them safe, if they get the zombie children "riled up." Of course, the one they want most is Carlton...

So, you know, the movie is stitched together from various cliches. And it's not really scary or very good, but hey, at least I didn't turn it off without finishing it, and that says something. I'm not sure what it says, exactly....