Writer, director, producer, editor and star Charles McCrann made this low budget - but hey, it played USA Network - movie where drug crops are sprayed with chemicals and turn growers into zombies. That's a novel idea and this movie started a subgenre of zombie films all about rednecks.

McCrann was a Princeton University and Yale Law School grad, senior vice-president of the Marsh & McLennan Companies financial services company and worked high up in the World Trade Center, where he sadly died on 9/11.

Under that suit and tie, you would have found the heart of a horror movie fan who finally got to make his own movie. It's not the best zombie movie you've ever seen, but hey, John Amplas (Martin) and Judith Brown (The Big Doll House) are in it. It also made the grade as a legit video nasty

When corrupt government officials order an illegal drugs crop to be dusted with the experimental herbicide Dromax, the hippies harvesting the plants are accidentally transformed into bloodthirsty zombies.

It's rather ironic that if certain films hadn't been banned by the BBFC during the 1980s, a lot less people would have bothered to hunt them down and watch them. Forest of Fear (AKA Bloodeaters AKA Toxic Zombies),for example, is one dreadfully amateurish effort that will only be of interest to most horror fans thanks to its notorious 'Video Nasty' label.

Precisely what got the censors in such a tizzy that they felt they had to ban the film is beyond me: admittedly, there are a few mean-spirited moments in the film where sympathetic characters are bumped off in nasty fashion, but these scenes are executed in such an unconvincing manner (the gore in this film is so cheap that it is more likely to amuse than to repulse) that they lose any shock value that they might have otherwise had.

Add the fact that almost every other aspect of this production—acting, direction, script—is equally as inept, and what you have is yet another title that avid horror fans will be compelled to watch only for the sake of completion.

Randomly stupid WTF moment #1: girl stands topless in the middle of the woods, washing herself, and gets shot a hole in the neck by a duo that appears to be couple of redneck hunters but actually turn out special service agents.

"Forest of Fear" is a Video Nasty in the purest meaning of the term. In other words, it's a crude and gratuitously violent shocker with an incredibly far-fetched premise, tasteless undertones and copious amounts of randomly absurd moments.

Randomly stupid WTF moment #2: frustrated housewife starts complaining about her drunken and useless husband to a complete stranger when she picks up the phone.

The incredibly incompetent authorities are searcher for a posse of hippie youngsters that build themselves a hidden camp in the forest to grow crops of illegal drugs. Suddenly an airplane spraying insecticides flies over and, in combination with their heavy consumption of soft drugs, the hippies turn into ravenous zombies! They take over the forest in no time and begin to extend their quest for human flesh to the camp sites surrounding the woods.

Randomly stupid WTF moment #3: guy quotes completely irrelevant line from the Humphrey Bogart classic "The Treasure of Sierra Madre".

Of all the once-infamous Video Nasties, "Forest of Fear" is definitely one of the most difficult ones to track down, despite being released under no less than three separate alternate titles and censored versions (the other two being "Toxic Zombies" and "Bloodeaters"). Maybe that's not too hard to understand, since you really have to be a very tolerant horror lunatic in order to enjoy this trashy piece of nonsense.

Randomly stupid WTF moment #4: guy confronted with zombie assailants spontaneously runs off in the woods and leaves behind his wife; two seconds after giving her a speech about how adventurous he is…

The gore is vile and sick-spirited but the effects are cheap, cheesy and probably couldn't even upset a 95-year-old grandmother suffering from palpitations of the heart. This stuff is nevertheless a lot of fun to watch when you're in front of the telly late at night with friends and a fridge that is full of beer. In that setting and ambiance, I even advise to play the randomly stupid WTF moment game!

Randomly stupid WTF moment #5: secretary girl, clearly the type that closely watches the number of calories she consumes per day, has a greasy hamburger sandwich for lunch whilst typing out a report. Sexy!

Writer/director Charles McCrann desperately attempts to generate suspense through rudimentary tricks, like ominous music and hectic POV shots, but it's all useless. "Forest of Fear" can only excel through its hilariously incompetent dialogs and spontaneous outbursts of splatter gore. Although I will give it one point extra for the downbeat twist in the end. This was Charles McCrann's one and only moment of cinematic horror glory, apparently, and according to the biography here on the website he was one of the people who died in the World Trade Center towers during the terrorist attacks on 9/11.

Randomly stupid WTF moment #6 (save the best for last): imbecilic guy rudely starts pulling retard-faces at a mentally handicapped boy before telling racist jokes to his teenage sister. And this at a time when these kids have been separated from their parents since the day before and probably feel worried to death. Oh, how I love 80's horror!