As we are still in development, there are no movie reviews online as of
now. However, I saw World War Z over the weekend, and I'll write a
quick, no padding review for it. The purpose of this post is not to
provide a movie review, but rather to give a rough idea of the focus and
format of future reviews to any readers.
World War Z
Rating: 3.5/5
Faithfulness to Source Material (World War Z by Max Brooks): 1/5
Plot Continuity: 4/5
Risk of Spoilers: 3/5
After Credits: Nothing
Introduction
I would like to begin by saying that I had high expectations going into this movie. One of my pet peeves is when people let their expectations affect their final opinion of a movie. If you go into this movie expecting it to be like the book, you will be sorely disappointed. I was excited to see a global scale war with zombies, complete with the tactics and socioeconomic impacts of the war finally make it to a film. World War Z seemed to hint at this, but eventually turned into a Resident Evil movie, but with Brad Pitt running through labs instead of Milla Jovovich (even with Pitt's golden locks, I tend to find Jovovich more attractive). This is probably due to the numerous re shoots that plagued the project. Regardless, I was able to forgive this letdown and enjoy the movie as a generic zombie flick. I have a feeling that the internet as a whole won't be as forgiving though.
Plot - 2/5
Don't watch this movie for the plot. It's not that it isn't there... It isn't even because the plot is bad... It's because the plot is thin. You can tell through the entire movie that there was something more than meets the eye, but that "something more" is never revealed. Once again, most of it is probably on the cutting room floor. Regardless of why the plot seemed so thin, it seemed suitable for a zombie movie, which I tend to watch for the sole purpose of watching people kill zombies. Some of the plot devices seemed a little weak, such as *SPOILERS* the "brilliant" doctor shooting himself, India fighting undead for so long that Jerusalem actually had time to build a wall but not long enough for anybody else in the world to catch on, etc. *SPOILERS* but there were no "holes" to my knowledge. However, this is to be expected when the plot is this thin. There isn't really a complicated enough plot to support holes.
Characters - 1/5
As disappointed as I was that this wasn't the smart zombie movie that I had been hoping for, Director Marc Forster made a good decision to skip all of that unnecessary character development. The first zombie kill occurs within the first 10 minutes of the movie, warning us early on that ain't nobody got time for that character development. None of the characters except Pitt's protagonist Gerry get enough screen time to make you care about them. In fact, one could argue that the only reason that his family exists is to give Pitt a reason to fight. Other characters come and go, and none of them seem important enough (or complex enough) to worry about. The good guys are the humans and the bad guys are the zombies. What else do you need to know?
Action/Suspense - 4/5
This is where World War Z excels. I loved watching massive hordes of zombies pile on top of each other to *SPOILERS* climb over Jerusalem's wall. *SPOILERS* Even with the lack of attachment to the characters, you wanted to see them win. Why? Because the bad guys are zombies. I like watching the good guys lose every now and then, but not when they're fighting zombies. Because of this, the incredibly generic corridor chase scenes actually felt slightly intense. Once again, this wasn't because you wanted Pitt to succeed, but because you wanted the zombies to fail. This being said, I lied about this being a typical zombie movie. It turned into one at the end (with the previously mentioned corridor scenes), but the rest of the movie felt very much like an action movie that just happened to have zombies in it - even more so than the Resident Evil movies. I attribute this feel to several factors, including the sheer scale of everything in the movie, the fact that a large portion of humanity is still human (and fighting back), the fact that a lot of it is outdoors and in broad daylight, and the traits of the zombies themselves (more on that later).
Final Thoughts
World War Z
Rating: 3.5/5
Faithfulness to Source Material (World War Z by Max Brooks): 1/5
Plot Continuity: 4/5
Risk of Spoilers: 3/5
After Credits: Nothing
Introduction
I would like to begin by saying that I had high expectations going into this movie. One of my pet peeves is when people let their expectations affect their final opinion of a movie. If you go into this movie expecting it to be like the book, you will be sorely disappointed. I was excited to see a global scale war with zombies, complete with the tactics and socioeconomic impacts of the war finally make it to a film. World War Z seemed to hint at this, but eventually turned into a Resident Evil movie, but with Brad Pitt running through labs instead of Milla Jovovich (even with Pitt's golden locks, I tend to find Jovovich more attractive). This is probably due to the numerous re shoots that plagued the project. Regardless, I was able to forgive this letdown and enjoy the movie as a generic zombie flick. I have a feeling that the internet as a whole won't be as forgiving though.
Plot - 2/5
Don't watch this movie for the plot. It's not that it isn't there... It isn't even because the plot is bad... It's because the plot is thin. You can tell through the entire movie that there was something more than meets the eye, but that "something more" is never revealed. Once again, most of it is probably on the cutting room floor. Regardless of why the plot seemed so thin, it seemed suitable for a zombie movie, which I tend to watch for the sole purpose of watching people kill zombies. Some of the plot devices seemed a little weak, such as *SPOILERS* the "brilliant" doctor shooting himself, India fighting undead for so long that Jerusalem actually had time to build a wall but not long enough for anybody else in the world to catch on, etc. *SPOILERS* but there were no "holes" to my knowledge. However, this is to be expected when the plot is this thin. There isn't really a complicated enough plot to support holes.
Characters - 1/5
As disappointed as I was that this wasn't the smart zombie movie that I had been hoping for, Director Marc Forster made a good decision to skip all of that unnecessary character development. The first zombie kill occurs within the first 10 minutes of the movie, warning us early on that ain't nobody got time for that character development. None of the characters except Pitt's protagonist Gerry get enough screen time to make you care about them. In fact, one could argue that the only reason that his family exists is to give Pitt a reason to fight. Other characters come and go, and none of them seem important enough (or complex enough) to worry about. The good guys are the humans and the bad guys are the zombies. What else do you need to know?
Action/Suspense - 4/5
This is where World War Z excels. I loved watching massive hordes of zombies pile on top of each other to *SPOILERS* climb over Jerusalem's wall. *SPOILERS* Even with the lack of attachment to the characters, you wanted to see them win. Why? Because the bad guys are zombies. I like watching the good guys lose every now and then, but not when they're fighting zombies. Because of this, the incredibly generic corridor chase scenes actually felt slightly intense. Once again, this wasn't because you wanted Pitt to succeed, but because you wanted the zombies to fail. This being said, I lied about this being a typical zombie movie. It turned into one at the end (with the previously mentioned corridor scenes), but the rest of the movie felt very much like an action movie that just happened to have zombies in it - even more so than the Resident Evil movies. I attribute this feel to several factors, including the sheer scale of everything in the movie, the fact that a large portion of humanity is still human (and fighting back), the fact that a lot of it is outdoors and in broad daylight, and the traits of the zombies themselves (more on that later).
Final Thoughts
- I can see how they couldn't have made the movie to follow the format of the book (the story told by many different survivors to a reporter), because the whole movie would've felt choppy and it would lose its continuity. Why not a mini series though? Each episode could focus on a different character, and they could develop a large scale arc over time. Paramount is already planning a sequel, because they don't care what I think, but I still like the idea.
- I mentioned already, but I love these zombies. I like the idea of the fast and nearly indestructible zombies with a hive mind. I find it frighting on a whole other level. While normal zombies scare us because they can mob us slowly and eat our brains, these zombies scare us because they can sprint after us, jump off buildings to grab at our helicopter, work together to climb massive structures, and then eat our brains. They're faster than us, stronger than us, and when it comes down to it, they work together better than us.
- I don't like how fast they turn. Twelve seconds? I can't say why I don't like it, but it bothers me.
- Why wasn't Emma Stone in this? We already know that she looks great killing zombies, so who wouldn't pay to see it happen again?
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