At the end of the day, I had to ask myself: Is “Dead Heist” one of the worst Direct to DVD titles out there?  “Dead Heist” is irrelevant, it’s obscure, and most likely it will probably not see the light of a new format, but is it terrible? Not really. In fact, on some guilty plain, this low budget urban cheapie was charming in its own way. It has a bit of “Dawn of the Dead” mixed with a dash of “From Dusk Til Dawn: Blood Money,” and oddly casts nothing but rappers in an attempt to garner the attention of renters. In all honesty, the only person I remotely recognize is Big Daddy Kane, and he’s not the cast member who provides the better performance. For a movie like this with all the potential to be bad, it’s really not and I was surprised.

Four thugs plan to rob a bank, they rob it on the night the monsters swarm to feed, and they’re stuck to fend them off until morning. Meanwhile, a hunter enters the bank unscathed and gives us a clearer picture of what these creatures are, but never a real explanation. For all the potential to be awful, the film pretty much just runs with the concept and never draws it out for longer than it has to.  “Dead Heist” knows when to quit while it’s ahead, and the plot can be rather exciting. I liked a lot of the action, and the scenes of pure monster ravaging works with gory effect. Webb is obviously working with a low budget, and you have to appreciate some of the make up and inherent creativity that went into the tension and suspense. “Dead Heist” works as a D grade senseless horror flick in many instances, and I had a good time.

Through all the crap and prejudgments, “Dead Heist” is strictly a guilty pleasure; but it’s also limp and stupid cash in on urban audiences with some ridiculous production qualities and a story that doesn’t even follow its own rules. We’re told the vampzombies have to be shot in the head to be killed, and yet they die with shots to the body, and there’s never an indication of these monsters are zombies or vampires, and I don’t think the writer ever intends to make it clear for us. For other movies it’s ambiguity, but with “Dead Heist” it can tend to be idiotic, especially since these monsters are unpredictable and haphazardly established. And as they go on the hunts lurking around in the shadows, there are so many questions confronting logic and lack there of. Where are the cops while this is all going on? Why doesn’t anyone else notice that this is going on? Where are the missing person’s reports and search parties?

Does anyone know what’s going on? How do all of these people who are basically raving blood drinking monsters manage to hide out and not be spotted at some point? Did all of the monsters appear in that small town, or just some of them? I couldn’t understand it, and the writers are too lazy to clear it all up. As for Big Daddy Kane, he’s basically a cartoon character but what can you expect? Kane’s often extremely over the top, and most of the time we’re never clear if he’s a villain or anti-hero, and when the writers ask us to believe he was once a scientist, you have to hold in your laughs. Kane can never approach the dialogue with conviction and hearing him struggle to deliver the origin of the vampires with scientific lingo, suspension of disbelief becomes an obligation. Meanwhile, I never understood why we’re given such an abrupt happy ending when really nothing was solved through all the blood shed. It’s apparent they were really out of ideas, and “Dead Heist” really just has nowhere to go once the climax rolls around.

It's nothing but a low grade, low rent, idiotic horror flick with the intent to grab Urban audiences with has beens and wannabe rap stars. But then again, I had a pretty good time with the stupidity. And Webb, in spite of the muck, really can direct some interesting horror sequences.

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