It’s not Shaun of the Dead and it’s not Zack Snyder’s Dawn of the Dead, but to say it’s a less funny and equally gory amalgam of the two wouldn’t be too far off. Zombieland starts off well, slows toward the middle and ends with an outright bang, which is sure to have audiences walking away more than satisfied and recommending this film to plenty of others.
Forgoing any attempt to show the audience how the world came to be infested with zombies, screenwriters Rhett Reese and Paul Wernick did well to jump straight into the action with only a throwaway line left to explain the current state of the world. Instead we are instantly introduced to Jesse Eisenberg (Adventureland) who plays Columbus, a name given to him based on where he’s from, which is carried over to the rest of the characters.
Columbus explains and demonstrates how he has managed to survive in the zombie ravaged wasteland he refers to as Zombieland by detailing his list of rules, which include staying in shape, fastening your seatbelt and always remember the double tap, a fun little rule that plays into the horror cliche of shooting the bad guy once just isn’t enough… you have to finish ’em off.
Making his way back to his hometown with the hope his family has survived he teams up with a loose cannon named Tallahassee played with expected zeal by Woody Harrelson and the sisterly duo of Wichita (Emma Stone) and Little Rock (Abigail Breslin). We follow these four as they make their way to the west coast in search of an amusement park rumored to be a safe haven from the flesh-eating humans now roaming the land.
Director Ruben Fleischer seems entirely aware of what makes zombie films cliche and while I can’t say this film is anything more than entertaining, I will say Fleischer brings enough to the table to help it stand out from the rest. As Columbus executes one of his rules the words pop up on screen in CGI text and it always draws a laugh and he plays everything just over the top enough to keep you engaged and never bored.
Best of all, and I assume anyone that sees this film will tell you the same, is a fantastic cameo that sets off the excellent third act. The role was originally set to go to the late Patrick Swayze before his battle with pancreatic cancer, but it ultimately went to an actor I have purposely left off the cast list in hopes my readers will go in without knowing who it is just as I did. It shouldn’t be more than a second before you figure it out on your own, but the entire time he’s on screen it’s instantly realized as one of the more entertaining moments I’ve seen this year.
For the most part Zombieland is a rah-rah kill ’em dead zombie slaughter film as more and more creative ways are thought up to dispose of the walking dead, a couple of which include blinking CG text reading “Zombie Kill of the Week!” This is a good, not great, film that feels just slightly longer than its 81 minute running time, but the audience I saw it with cheered as the credits rolled and since some of them were dressed as zombies and had their faces painted to the 9’s I would say it satisfies its intended audience and then some.
