Return of the Living Dead 4: Necropolis (2005) Reviews

A pair of orphaned teens experience an unexpected reunion with their parents in this fourth installment of the long-running Return of the Living Dead franchise. After a traffic accident kills his folks, high-school senior Julian (John Keefe) leads a more or less typical suburban life. Sure, he's a little depressed, and sure, his brother, Jake (Alexandru Geoana), has a problem with matches. But otherwise everything is business as usual. All of that changes when their friend Zeke (Elvin Dandel) is injured in a dirt-bike accident and rushed to the hospital. Although the authorities claim Zeke is dead, he's actually carted off to a secret laboratory by the evil Hybratech corporation, whose scientists plan to experiment on him with a chemical that can reanimate the dead. Unfortunately for Julian and Jake, their uncle Charles (Peter Coyote) is one of the bad guys -- and he's not above using members of his own family as test subjects. With a group of friends in tow, the boys must infiltrate Hybratech's lab, find Zeke, and fend off a horde of angry zombies. Filmed back to back in Romania and Ukraine with Return of the Living Dead 5: Rave to the Grave, Return of the Living Dead 4: Necropolis premiered on the SciFi Channel cable network before receiving a DVD release. Both films were directed by Ellory Elkayem, who previously helmed Eight Legged Freaks. ~ Brian J. Dillard, Rovi