Good luck in trying to make sense of this one: it's a total mess, even by '80s Italian horror movie standards. The free-wheeling, nonsensical plot goes something like this:Vietnam vet Fred Brown (Robert Vaughn) returns home to Louisiana to find his wife in bed with another man; after killing the adulterous couple, and his in-laws, Fred disposes of the bodies, cleans up the scene, and frees the family's pet birds, after which he is attacked by a hawk, which claws out his eyes.Years later, the blind ex-soldier's crime somehow remains undiscovered, and he now spends his time at home studying bird song. Hoping to locate a rare species of woodpecker, a group of Louisiana college students pay the old man a visit, and, following his advice, they set out for the swamps. After stumbling across a decomposing body in a car (which they opt to ignore), they finally stumble upon the old, deserted house where Brown's murder spree took place and decide to spend the night, firing up a generator in the basement.During the night, the friends experience a series of strange, inexplicable occurrences, including grisly hallucinations, after which they are attacked by several zombies and a supernatural force (which pulls one unfortunate victim into the gears of the generator). In the morning, the two remaining survivors escape the house, meeting Brown as they leave. The blind man enters the dilapidated property, where he is attacked by a flock of birds. The End.None of this follows any kind of logic, there's no explanation for the supernatural goings on, the violence is bloody but unconvincing, and the ending incredibly weak. Although not an official part of the Zombie series, it's easy to see why Killing Birds was given the alternative title of Zombie 5: it's every bit as random, badly acted and shoddily directed as Zombie 3 and Zombie 4—unfortunately, it's also a lot more boring.

Where the hell were the killing birds? There were birds, yes, but they didn't kill anybody! Argh! There is one zombie shuffling around in this film, though, killing off teenagers in some empty house. But don't ask me why or where that zombie came from, because once again, there's no explanation for any of the events whatsoever. So why on earth am I rating this fantastic film actually 3/10? Hmmm... Let me think. Well, the opening scene is pretty solid. It sets a certain dreary mood (and those teenagers haven't arrived yet at that point). Ehrr... It's got somewhat of an atmosphere to it, this movie, somehow. Uhm... What else? Huh... Oh, yes: It's Italian! There you go: That's 3 points. Yay!

It's a sad part in any actor's career when they have to resort to this kind of malarky to make the mortgage payments. Thank God Robert Vaughn was able to recover from this mindless excuse for a movie--forget "zombie" movie. And whoever decided to link this to the far-superior Fulci series by tacking "Zombi 5" onto the title needs to be taken out and maimed. A lot. Not only does this bear little-to-no resemblance to Fulci's films, it was made prior to some of them, so to be #5 in a series is pretty stupid in and of itself. The original title doesn't even make sense until the very end--the birds themselves kill only one person. The first 10 minutes or so was quite interesting, I will say that--as long as no one talked. As soon as we "fast forwarded" to the kids at college, it went downhill. Fast. And it's a shame these kids didn't sit at Vaughn's feet for a few months to get a hint of what acting is supposed to be--in that department, he's the only redeeming factor. The plot is stupid, the acting is poor, the deaths take too long and aren't even that good, and you can't wait for these whiny brats to die horribly. Oh well, at least now I can say I've seen it. Now if I can only forget it.

(Killing Birds) Contains a bit of flesh, some gore. A group of college kids searching for an elusive species of bird end up at an old house that is home to some rather surly spirits out for blood... it all goes back to one of the kid's past where his dad killed the rest of his family. - - - Well, it's at least better than the past two Zombi "sequels," even if it's still pretty dreary. "Killing Birds" at least starts out decent enough and builds up a little atmosphere, but loses most of the momentum thanks to some terrible script writing. The background about the Vietnam soldier is handled badly and seeks to conceal a twist that's far too easy to figure out. There are a few gore moments worthy of remembering; however, the movie as a whole is going to disappoint fans of killer birds and zombies... don't even get me started on fans of killer zombie birds.*1/2 out of 4