|
 Is
there anything more fun than watching Woody Harrelson annihilate a horde
of the walking dead? Not too much this year. Slight, but wry, witty
and a lot of fun, Zombieland is a last gasp of summer silliness that is
welcome in the days before the big drama-heavy, late-fall Oscar push.
Every
game’s gotta have rules, and when the prize for winning happens to be
the ability to live another day, those rules are best adhered to
carefully. The young man known to us only as Columbus (- named for
his ultimate destination) gives us some quick exposition about the
disease that began its life in some mad cows and wound up making mad
zombies of the entire human race. The nerdish fellow gives us his rock
solid rules for surviving a zombie attack that helpfully pop up onto the
screen as they are either enacted or woefully unheeded with undeadly
results. This zombie apocalypse has left only a handful of survivors
across the nation, each as wary as the other and all seeking a mythical
zombie-free destination. It is on his way to find his parents in Ohio
that Columbus first runs into Tallahassee, a cowboy in a Mad Max-ed out
Escalade. The two form a tetchy alliance with the chattering, cautious
Columbus the polar opposite of the wild, gun-happy Tallahassee, who
thinks nothing about facing dozens of gory undead with little more than
sports and gardening equipment in his unending quest for his favourite
snack food. It’s while on the hunt for a Twinkie that Columbus and
Tallahassee are conned badly by two sister survivors who steal their
ride and ammo and leave them for dead repeatedly. Giving safety in
numbers a shot, the guys join the girls on their journey to the place
where the youngest of their little group, the worldly-wise tween Little
Rock, was last happy, Pacific Playland, yet another alleged safe haven
from the constant threat of the cannibal undead.
Director Ruben Fleischer gives us speedy, mindless zombies that gush
black blood from meat-dripping maws and loads of gooey, stringy
intestines and membranes everywhere. He laces such gruesome sights with
a sharp and quirky script. (- Bill Murray? Whaaa?) Not a lot of
care is given to the believability of their quest: The whole idea of
turning on all the lights and bells and whistles at an amusement park
mere miles away from where you just finished running for your life from
a zombie horde and thinking nothing bad will happen is really stupid.
That sequence was fun to watch, but at this stage in cinema the really
terrifying climactic event in an amusement park is itself an undead
premise. Whatever; as a completely nihilistic kill-all-the-zombies
popcorn-munching fiesta, Zombieland is full of win. Woody Harrelson
really gets a chance to do some cannibalism of his own, munching the
script and everything around it and it’s hilarious to watch. As
Tallahassee, the whack-job cowboy who really, really hates zombies,
Harrelson is having a great time firing a variety of guns and gleefully
dispatching all comers. Jesse Eisenberg plays the nebbishy Columbus,
the least likely survivor of a zombie holocaust. Eisenberg is sweet and
earnest as the nerd-next-door whose only ambition with the opposite sex
is to gently push a lock of hair over a girl’s ear. Awww… Though
seemingly made for this type of role, Eisenberg runs the risk of
becoming the poor man’s version of Michael Cera, who could have easily
played this character. Emma Stone is beguiling in darker locks, raccoon
eye make-up and go-go boots as the treacherous and practical Wichita and
Abigail Breslin’s wry line deliveries, particularly in her passenger
side chats with Harrelson about Miley Cyrus, show why she is the most
promising child star today.
Neither as hilarious as 2004’s Shaun of the Dead, nor as harrowing as
Zack Snyder’s Dawn of the Dead remake also from 2004, Zombieland carves
out a niche in between by utilising clever pop culture references and
fast pacing to create an unexpectedly droll horror comedy that makes for
a good time at the movies.
~ The
Lady Miz Diva
Oct 1st,
2009
© 2006-2022 The Diva Review.com
|
