Hey, AMC, can we "demand" more of this?

There is some cool stuff on AMC (formerly American Movie Classics, now more commonly known as %$#& in film lovers' circles) right now, but the catch is that it ain't on the actual channel. No, it's in the On Demand section as part of the "Fearfest" theme for October. I was hoping there would be more than 5 old-school zombie movies available throughout the month*, but at least these ones are there, and they ARE old, uncut, and commercial-free. There are a few spots promoting the new "Walking Dead" series, but they are before and after the movie.

You can see how this is a departure for the modern AMC.

The other day, I watched 1959's "Teenage Zombie," a B-movie that is cheap, poorly made, not particularly well acted, and, at least in this print, looks like AMC stuffed it in the back pocket of its blue jeans and forgot it was there when it threw the pair into the washing machine.

In other words, this is EXACTLY the kind of thing we need more of on AMC!

I'd love to see B-movies on the channel again, not exiled to the website or to 4:45 AM screenings in the middle of the week, but I do appreciate the On Demand thing. To be truthful, "Teenage Zombies" isn't a great genre movie, and it doesn't even provide a lot of "so bad it's good" moments--in fact, it's kind of dull in spots--but it's the kind of crap I like to see every now and then.

The film opens with great promise, giving us a bunch of goofy "teenagers" acting like adults thought teenagers acted like in 1959, but it doesn't really deliver on the zombie action. It's more like Teenagers Held Prisoner with the Goal of Eventually Turning Them into Zombies. However, there is some fun here if you're in the right mood. The plot has real potential, with a female mad scientist--her gender in itself offering a nice change of pace--planning to inject the kids, then EVERYONE, with a nerve gas that will essentially turn them into zombies. While the screenplay doesn't quite live up to that cool premise, it does manage to cram in spies, a gorilla, and what I consider a pretty cool twist at a pivotal moment.

I'm not going into a lot of detail, but the movie itself isn't the thing, but rather the fact that AMC has my expectations so low that it can give fans a real treat with a simple seasonal offering like this and the other 4 flicks on demand right now. AMC didn't exactly dig too deep for Bela Lugosi's "White Zombie" or Vincent Price's "The Last Man on Earth," but they're free. "King of the Zombies" always deserves a chance to be seen, and while 1936's "Revolt of Zombies" is no classic, either, I'm just glad to see a movie from 1936 associated with AMC.

You can find "Teenage Zombies" all over the Internet, but it's nice to see it on TV, even if it's not conventional TV. I can only hope that AMC will serve up a big Turkeyfest for November and unleash some of the B-movies it streams on its website.

*This is what FIOS-TV has, anyway. There's a lot more at AMC's website, so maybe your cable provider has more in its On Demand section.