Mutant (1984)

From the Box: "While on vacation, two brothers discover a small town's hideous secret. A nearby chemical plant has been dumping toxic waste just outside of town, turning the townspeople into contaminated, mutant zombies. Now there's nowhere to run as the growing army of blood thirsty ghouls take over the town and devouir the remaining humans, one by one."

What You Get: Rednecks, toxic waste, and a mutating community. Oh, and humans gone leech.

Origin of Zombies: Exposure to toxic waste mutating people into zombie-like leeches

Zombie Traits: Appearance, swarming like zombies

Unzombie Traits: Everything but appearance (how they usually move)

The "Heroes": A vacationing city boy, a sheriff, a school teacher, a redneck asshole

Zombie Killing Weapons of Choice: Fire, boards, pistols, shotgun, molotav cocktails, bright light

The Goals: Run, hide, survive

End Result: Just as the boy & teacher were about to get killed the full-blown police force shows up, guns down the mutants, and save the day

Zombie Rating: (not zombies, just zombie-like mutants)*

Notes: Just because the packaging says zombies, doesn't mean the movie has zombies. Case in point, this movie. People get sick & mutate into, what's best described as, mutant leeches. They are not undead, they don't consume flesh, and for the most part don't act in any way like zombies (though one scene in the doctor's office when the sheriff is being stalked by multiple 'mutants' is zombie-ish)

Weird ass mutants who suck blood through oozing wounds on their palms. WTF

Toward the end the movie does look like a zombie movie, with the town overrun by these mutants and our heroes hiding for safety & survival.

*The last 20 minutes could bump this rating up if you only ignore the 80 minutes prior