Unreal Movie Review: Zombieland
Zombieland’s greatest success and biggest failure are one in the same; the fact that the entire film can be condensed into this one sentence plot summary:
A rag-tag group of humans come together to fight their way through zombie hoards after the complete destruction of earth.
And that’s not even a long sentence!
Simplicity is Zombieland’s biggest plus, because frankly, an hour and a half of demonstrations on the various ways to dismember a zombie is in fact thoroughly entertaining, and is made even more so when the “rag-tag group of humans” ends up being incredible likable and memorable.
Known only by their hometowns, Wichita (Emma Stone), Little Rock (Abigail Breslin), Tallahassee (Woody Harrelson) and Columbus (Jesse Eisenberg) fight, spar, bicker, but ultimately team up to fight the waves of blood-hungry zombies that currently populate most of America. Witchita and Little Rock are sisters, headed to Pacific Playland on the west coast where they hear there are no zombies, Columbus is on his way back home from college where he hopes his parents will still be alive, and Tallahassee is headed back to Florida and in desperate search of the world’s last Twinkie.
“Well OK, but no tongue.”
Stone and Breslin are adorable in their own rights, but it’s the chemistry between Harrelson and Eisenberg that makes Zombieland great. Eisenberg’s Columbus is meek and scrawny, yet knows how to handle himself in post-apocalyptic America thanks to a written down set of rules he lives by (#1: Cardio, #4 Avoid bathrooms, #12 Don’t be a hero) whereas Harrelson’s Tallahassee harkens back to his Natural Born Killers character, only this time his mass murder sprees are perfectly acceptable, as they’re aimed at those who are already dead.
I would almost go so far as to say that Harrelson makes this movie what it is singlehandedly, taking “badass” to a level not really seen before in most horror films that are full of screaming coeds and their douchey boyfriends. Rather it’s one of the only times I can remember a character truly embracing their current circumstances, and going one step past that to actually enjoy them. Whether it’s with a baseball bat, hedge clippers, a sawed off shotgun or an M16, Tallahasse has realized he’s was put on earth to do one thing, kill Nazis zombies. But now that you mention it, he would have been a perfect fit on the Basterds squad as well.
Quite possibly this year’s Halloween costume.
But when I said the one sentence descriptor was the movie’s biggest failure as well, I mean it, though by “biggest” I should say “only,” because it’s really the only flaw I can point out in the whole affair. Zombieland is completely 100% character driven, because the plot? Well, there really isn’t one to speak of. Tallahassee and Columbus head out east to try to find a safe haven, only midway through the film, they’re turned around by Wichita and Little Rock who want to go west. Aside from one brief stay in a celebrity’s house (which ends up being one of the greatest movie cameos ever filmed), not much really happens, and there are actually stretches of the film you’ll find yourself saying, “Wow, I haven’t even seen a zombie in like half an hour!”
But when the whole world is destroyed, what else is there to really do besides wander aimlessly from place to place? And with box office success, and an open ending, this is one horror sequel I’m actually praying we actually get to see, and that’s not something you hear very often these days.
4 out of 5 stars
Everyone knows zombies love square dancing.
I’m pretty sure it’s rule #17 “(Don’t) be a hero!” 🙂
Excellent movie. Loved it!
Nice review…I’m definitely going to check this out.