It's another film that's not on imdb. (TheMovieDB and LetterboxD have heard about it, but they don't have much information.) I had no idea whether it belonged in my zombie marathon, but it had "dead" in the title so I gave it a whirl.

Is this a zombie film? I'm still not sure, to be honest. I watched the film, but that's unclear. Higaseru-sensei (?) is a cannibal who's kidnapping people to feed to her younger brother, who may or may not be a zombie. His skin colour, lack of speech, minimal intellect and fondness for human flesh would support this hypothesis, but if he's also remarkably obedient. He does whatever his sister says. He certainly hasn't eaten her yet. Mr Barbed Wire Garotte also ends up looking zombie-like, but only briefly. You'd look like him too if you'd been through what he's experienced.

To be honest, the film's more disturbing with no supernatural excuses. If everyone's human, then it's potentially real and Higaseru-sensei is a monster beyond all imagination. Those scenes where she's cutting up those piles of meat... ewww. However, (SPOILER) the finale is a mild suggestion that zombies are involved after all, because any normal person in that state should be as dead as a doornail. You certainly wouldn't be capable of looking at yourself and screaming. However, that might be dramatic licence for irony, or else perhaps just bad filmmaking.

Our heroine wants to be a cook. She's studying at a cooks' academy. Unfortunately, the film began with a blood-covered woman running away from someone in a yellow raincoat with a machete... and she's about to meet Mr Raincoat. Next thing we know, she's one of five people in what looks like an abandoned warehouse. Higaseru-sensei appears and announces that nerve gas is being fed into the air and that everyone will die unless they start killing each other. If they whittle themselves down to a single survivor, that lucky candidate will be invited for a very special meal!

This looked like bollocks to me. I'm developing a low tolerance for battle royale stories that don't work hard enough to sell their premise to the audience. Do I believe that all this would happen? Kinji Fukasaku's 2000 film Battle Royale succeeds in that regard, as does Future Diary. Fate/Stay Night can bog off. That lot are all idiots. Here, similarly, no. If Higaseru-sensei wants human flesh, why doesn't she immediately kill everyone? Why make five enemies who all hate her like poison and have every reason to try to murder her? Why show her face to them (and they recognise her!) and then claim that she's willing to let one of them go? Surely anyone she released would go straight to the police and have her arrested? None of that counts as a plot hole, admittedly, since she's batshit insane and hence capable of anything, but "SHE'S CRAAAAZY!!!" is an unsatisfying reason for things to happen in drama.

This isn't a good film, but it's reasonably effective in its nasty cannibal way. It's also far better made than you'd expect from something not on imdb. The acting's okay. There's some characterisation, e.g. Violent Git, or the idol (?) with a terrible personality. Higaseru-sensei's plan is absurd and hasn't been thought through properly (as the ending demonstrates), but that's okay since rational decisions weren't her forte. You could watch far worse than this.