With digital video equipment so readily available, the DVD market is flooded with enough amateur vanity pieces to give independent cinema a bad name. Once in a while something pops up to reaffirm my belief in the indie scene, often made by auteurs at least 5-10 years younger than myself. Imagine my surprise and skepticism at learning about Emily Hagins, a girl from Austin, Texas who produced her debut at age 12.

Pathogen is another entry in the zombie movie lexicon, a genre many filmmakers find easy to jump into. Emily admits this herself, and credits the splatterfest Undead for teaching her that horror can be fun and even funny. Regardless of this inspiration Pathogen plays quite seriously aside from brief moments of levity. The ending is much darker than I expected from both the story and the fact that Emily was 10 when she wrote it. Also notable is the originality she brings to the glut of walking dead films that tend to tread familiar ground.

One thing I haven’t seen before is the method of spreading the zombie plague. An infected water supply has been the cause of many fictional catastrophes but seems especially frightening here with frequent visual references to its ubiquitous role in our lives. Simple shots of drinking glasses, dripping faucets and drain pipes become harbingers of unavoidable doom. The main character suspects something is amiss and uses an unsoaked toothbrush in caution. Meanwhile all around her people receive casual death sentences as they become unknowingly tainted through their daily activities.

Another unique slant is the primarily pre-teen point of view. It’s a natural choice for a writer and director in middle school but is one I rarely see outside of more comedic titles like The Monster Squad. Even in the scariest movies protagonist kids almost always make it to the end in one piece. When most of the cast is under driving age it’s inevitable that some fresh-faced heads are gonna roll. Of the few adults seen nearly all are killed—some twice—adding another disturbing layer to the helpless atmosphere.

The documentary Zombie Girl: The Movie details many of the obstacles Emily faced in making her magnum opus. I’m glad to say her first-timer mistakes are outweighed by the strengths. Special effects are obviously homemade but are shot for maximum effect. There’s plenty of gore, including a nasty eyeball gouge. Contemporary music is used sparingly and better chosen than in many films, indie or otherwise. Continuity is handled well considering the difficulties of managing several locations and a sporadic shooting schedule that stretched over many months. The weakest parts come from the acting and sound, but the dialogue scenes have superior editing to Kevin Smith’s Clerks. Keeping in mind that this project was a crash course in all the cinematic arts for a filmmaker finding her specialty, it’s an impressive feat.

As with Mark Borchardt’s self-produced thriller Coven, Pathogen is most likely more engaging after absorbing the making-of documentary. Coven has the benefit of being included on the American Movie disc for back-to-back viewing. You’ll have to work harder to find Zombie Girl: The Movie, at least until it gets its own DVD release. Still, Pathogen stands on its own and comes with a bunch of extra features. (The menu screen of zombies perpetually feasting over a pair of twitching legs is a nice touch.)

Come back tomorrow for an interview with Emily Hagins, and find out more about her films at her own site.

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