"Zombieland" Review - Written by Anthony T

Zombieland
Year: 2009
Director: Ruben Fleischer
Studio: Columbia Pictures
Stars: Jessie Eisenberg, Woody Harrelson, Emma Stone
MPAA Rating: R
Running Time: 80 Mins





The zombie genre has exploded in the last five years with “Dawn of the Dead (remake)” “28 Weeks Later”, “Shaun of the Dead”, “Dead Snow”, George Romero’s upcoming “Survival of the Dead” and the “Resident Evil” sequels. Now here’s the latest entry “Zombieland”.

The film is about Columbus, a geeky nerd (Jessie Eisenberg), who lives by a set of rules in mist of a zombie apocalypse. While walking in the middle of the highway, he meet up with Tallahassee (Woody Harrelson), a gun toting zombie killer with a fond for twinkles. On their cross- country adventure, they hook up a pair of sisters (Emma Stone, Abigail Breslin) who are running scams, while surviving this zombie mayhem. Soon they don’t know is what’s worse, trying to survive a zombie apocalypse or trying to survive with each other.

There are some films that don’t attempt to have a plot or any of the elements that you can recommend, but afterward you come out of theater saying that you had a fun time. This was the case with “Zombieland”. This is no Shaun of the Dead by no means, but I couldn’t help myself enjoy the film for what it is.

Ruben Fleischer’s direction was good enough to make this a fun guilty pleasure film. The way he directs the action scenes help this film become a fun one to watch. Fleischer directs them in quick and rapid style that helps makes the scenes feel like that you are actually watching a full-fledged horror film. But makes this film successful is the way he directs the comedy scenes. I liked how he adds title card repeatedly, when you come across one of the rules that the main character lives by. It got kind of redundant at first but once the humor clicked, it became funny. He does a very good job creating chemistry be Jessie Eisenberg and Woody Harrelson (who is very funny here). The chemistry between the actors is probably the key thing that makes this very fun. If the chemistry between the two main actors failed, then this probably would have been a hard film to sit through.

Rhett Reese and Paul Wernick’s screenplay was average for the most part. There were things that I liked with this screenplay. First, I liked how they named each of the main characters based on a city. It adds to the humorous element that is in the film already and makes you get into the story, if you figure the joke second. Second, their strongest writing came at a point in the film where the celebrity cameo (which I will not spoil) happens. That was about a good ten minutes where the four are at his house and they find him still alive. It was my favorite part of the film, because the writing there was funny and got most laughs out of me during any part of the film. Finally, it doesn’t take itself to seriously, as it tries to be it’s own movie and not other “Shaun of the Dead” clone.

The screenplay has its problems though. I thought there was little character or story development, as it made me what to know more about what happen in the beginning. Maybe if they set this film around the time the zombie invasion started, this would have been something special, instead of a guilty pleasure film. Also, I would have liked to have seen some scenes written a little longer, because this felt like a fast film at eighty minutes. Hopefully, they will correct that for the inevitable sequel.

“Zombieland” is no “Shaun of the Dead”, but if you are looking for a fun time at the cinema, then this is movie for you.

Review Rating: Three and a Half Stars.