EI Cinema relaunches their Shock-O-Rama label (and a welcome return it is) with this the first of a handful of planned "in-house" productions that brings in writer-director Brett Piper for this story of a jerk-off fetish photographer (played with aplomb by Joseph Farrell) who takes a group of wannabe models (that includes EI regular Misty Mundae) to an abandoned old asylum only to fall prey to the resurrected spirit of the former owner who had a makeshift torture chamber in the basement of the facility.

It's certainly nice to see EI focussing more on bringing us something other than the erotic spoofs they've been cranking out under their Seduction Cinema banner for the past couple of years and while this is a flawed first effort and it does suffer from too leisurely a pace; it's still not a bad starting point. While not quite on the level of Piper's 2000 effort, Drainiac!, this does have acceptable acting (heck, even Mundae gets a role where she doesn't have to do any sort of lesbian scene), decent make-up effects and a couple of alright deaths - but the horror elements are sadly downplayed for the first hour during which a sense of dullness creeps in on the viewer and is never fully shaken.

The Screaming Dead is certainly a comendable effort, and like I said before it's great to see Shock-O-Rama back in business, but I do wish there would've been more undead ghoul mayhem on hand. (Chris Hartley, 3/21/04)

Directed By: Brett Piper.
Written By: Brett Piper.

Starring: Rob Mankiewicz, Rachael Robbins, Misty Mundae, Joseph Farrell.

Picture Ratio: Full Frame.

Picture Quality: EI brings this to us with a stable transfer that sports sharp colours and a solid picture throughout.

Extras: They've certainly not skimped on the extras here as we get a decent "making of" featurette, a featurette that's basically a tribute to co-star Misty Mundae, an interesting featurette on the actual abandoned New Jersey asylum they filmed at, a "Weekend Of Horrors" featurette, a mildly amusing "Eye On Cinema" newsreel spoof, a still gallery, one pointless easter egg (not sure if there's more, but I only found the one) and a trailer (plus trailers to Shock-O-Rama's upcoming titles Suburban Nightmare - which looks great, Dracula, Bite Me! and Skin Crawl).