Just after graduating from high school, pretty Wendy Hearst (Shellie Marie Shartzer) disappeared and was presumed dead. The friends she left behind include slacker Patrick (co-writer Eric Lehning) and his introverted fraternal twin brother Carol (co-writer Cody DeVos), their kid brother Beetle (Brett Miller), buddy Rody (composer Jordan Lehning), and Addy (Leah High). After the in-absentia funeral service, Carol takes Beetle cicada-hunting and they discover that while Wendy is dead, she's still walking around. They bring her home to Patrick and try to figure out how to bring her back to life (even as she is slowly decaying). When Rody skips town and puts Patrick in charge of looking after his folks' house for the summer, they hide her there and make the discovery that she has to feed off of live things. Meanwhile, Addy is putting the moves on Wendy's grieving boyfriend Brian (Josh Duensing) and Carol (who is in love with Addy) has to court Addy's pretentious and self-absorbed friend Anne (Tia Shearer) to divert suspicion of their activities. As Patrick sinks into his obsession with Wendy, Carol must balance keeping an eye on Patrick (with Beetle's help) with his goal of winning Addy before the end of the summer (when she will return to private school). Narrated by kid brother Beetle, MAKE-OUT WITH VIOLENCE is not always consistent in tone but it is nicely idiosyncratic treatment of the zombie girlfriend sub-genre (DEADGIRL fans need not apply) although it does have its share of expertly dolled-out icky moments. The characters are well rendered thanks to an extended setup (the girl Wendy used to be is as strongly established conveyed as David Lynch's Laura Palmer so the connection of the characters to her even in zombie form is believable) and the performances are good overall (High, DeVos, and Miller are particularly good). It is interesting that the characters adjust to the "zombie" situation so quickly, but also refreshing that no hipper-than-thou character starts spouting movie references. Also, refreshingly, the subplots involving the main and supporting characters do more than simply pad out the running time. The film also shows some mature restraint in developing the Patrick's increasingly unnerving intimacy with Wendy (the Carol-Addy-Brian-Anne subplot hits the right dramatic and comedic notes - and some additional ones - to leaven the more depressing Patrick-Wendy scenes) including the pseudo-bondage of zombie Wendy's restraints. The deadpan humor actually works (whether it disguises the limited range of some of the actors is hard to tell as the characterizations largely ring true) and a few stilted bits lacking total verisimilitude are organic to fringe filmmaking (somehow I could imagine this kind of film being made on 16mm during the nineties indie film boom, although likely with less technical finesse than digital filmmaking allowed here). The film took four years to complete and the end result (and the effort that went into promoting it evident in the extras) was certainly worth it, with none of the confessed setbacks and compromises evident to the viewer. I would recommend the film to both open-minded horror fans, indie film aficionados and genre filmmaking hopefuls as an example of an independent film approached throughout the production process as a mainstream production (in terms of casting, art direction, location scouting, shooting, editing, scoring, and full promotion and distribution).