Braindead, Peter Jackson's deadpan horror comedy, is a cult classic and one of the bloodiest movies ever made

Timothy Balme, Diana Penalver, Elizabeth Moody;  Peter Jackson

Whatever happened to good old movie violence? Straight-to-DVD torture porn might still be there for the gore hounds, but there once was a time when cinematic violence had purpose. When it highlighted the era's zeitgeist or darkly poked fun at the times. When it was relevant and timely. When it was seriously funny.

Take Braindead, the 1992 cult classic and a strong contender for the bloodiest movie ever made. Helmed early in his career by blockbusting Hobbit filmmaker Peter Jackson, the film is outlandish, at times frightening and always hysterical - a deadpan horror-comedy classic that acts as a blood-soaked tribute to creative filmmaking at its finest.

In Wellington, New Zealand, lives mama's boy Lionel, a wet-behind-the-ears man-child living under the thumb of his domineering mother, Vera. One day, while spying on Lionel and his girlfriend at a zoo, Vera is bitten by a Sumatran rat-monkey that (naturally) turns her into a bloodthirsty zombie.

And soon enough much of their small town becomes infected, leaving it to Lionel to solve the situation by the only way possible: killing every single one of these undead horrors.

Like similar laugh-fests Evil Dead II and Re-Animator, Braindead is a genre send-up. A blood-soaked love letter that loads its 100-plus minutes with scare-conventions turned on their head, before tossing them into a blender and slamming down the "pulp" button.