Zombie 5: Killing Birds is another in the series of unrelated Italian zombie films. It may carry the Zombie moniker, but it is not related to Zombie 4: After Death nor to Zombi 3. Also, you will notice that midway they even decided to change the spelling of zombie, from the Italian to the English version. So, the Zombie tag is nothing more than a marketing gimmick at this point. You will also notice that when the film starts, it is merely Killing Birds, no Zombie to be found. At the film's end, you will know that it has very little in the way of birds or zombies; both are much more prominent in (still unrelated) Zombi 3. The last thing you will discover, if you make it all the way through, is that it is easily the weakest of the bunch, and offers none of the nonsensical fun that previous installments provided. Again, this is assuming that you make it all the way to the conclusion.
Killing Birds opens in a way to make you think it will be a slasher film. A Vietnam vet has returned home to find his wife in bed with another man. In short order, he slits the man's throat and leaves the room to await his wife's inevitable discovery of said slit and subsequent rapid exit. He slowly stalks her into the couple's aviary, where he repeats the throat-cutting process. Meanwhile, what one could assume are the in-laws (though no evidence is given) arrive with - again - what one could assume is his baby. He kills them in decidedly slasher movie fashion. You know, no matter how fast you run and how slow the killer walks, he will always be right there with the death blow. The cleanup of the deceased results in the, until now, faceless vet killer getting his eyes plucked by a couple of hawks in the aviary. The final scene of this ten-minute, dialogueless sequence has a bandaged man being led into a hospital while his baby is taken away.
Now, as is apt to happen in these Zombie movies, there is a jump in time without any indication that it happened. The scene shifts to a college campus that is populated with thirty-somethings that have trouble talking straight. They are excited because they get to head into protected Louisiana land in search of an ivory-billed woodpecker! I can sense your excitement from here! The group is led by mush-mouthed Steve, joined by his ex-girlfriend reporter, a photographer, a computer geek who makes stick figure porn (I kid you not), and a few other assorted hangers on. They head off to meet the last known man to see the bird, and guess what? He is blind, his face scarred, and he's played by Robert Vaughn.
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