Monday, August 28, 2017

TOP 3 ZOMBIE MOVIES YOU MAY HAVE MISSED and CAN'T MISS



I have been into zombie movies for far too long really. I love the construct of these pieces as they place humans -- trapped in a world where the dead are rising in much the same way water is rising in a flood film or tornadoes are spinning in a tornado film -- against each other and with each other as they attempt to survive. The best ones, of course, are when they take some real miss fits and put them into this survival situation and force them to work together despite drastic differences in background or mindset. So nothing ground breaking here, this is why we all love them.

So as the new zombie movie avalanche has continued to pile good, horrible, wonderful and innovative films in our hard drives I'd like to chime in on 3 people may have missed and really SHOULD NOT. So let's do it.

#1 if the British are the king of zombie movies and they can make a claim for this, the Korean's have struck a blow with the 2016 film TRAIN TO BUSAN. Probably the worst thing about this film was it's trailer and so sadly it's release was far from filled with fanfare.  Now to give you a simple NON SPOILER take on this film, it is WORTH the subtitles folks. Korean film makers are really good at hard core action films, but when they turned their attention to zombies they brought a soft heart and a brutal reality to bare. And what a great primes, 'you're trying to escape a zombie apocalypse by train, while the train, car by car, is becoming infected.' Mix in the love of a daughter for her father and a father for himself, the love of a teenage cheerleader  for her jock boyfriend, two sisters for each other and a muscle man obsessed with the survival of his unborn child and his wife and we are GO FOR AWESOME. Of course the key to all great zombie films is the villain and trust me, you'll be rooting for this guys demise louder than your neighbors will enjoy.

TRAIN TO BUSAN PREVIEW

#2 has to be on my list as a personal preference because I am a teacher, love zombie movies and have always enjoyed either total realism in a zombie flick or laugh out loud humor. COOTIES, a 2015 comedy starring Elijah Wood as a sarcastic failed writer who looks down at his coworkers at a middle school where he finds himself a substitute teacher, is right up my alley. The piece makes fun of teachers, clueless principals, drug addicted bus drivers and even the chicken nuggets industry. I'd guess this one is for anyone who ever wanted to kill and eat their principal or who wanted to punch their students for trying to eat them. The humor is over the top and absurd so if you're not into that kind of thing in your zombie film, pass on this one, but if you do don't miss this little gem.

COOTIES PREVIEW

#3 JERUZALEM is a film I'm pretty sure everyone missed and I'd like to preface this by saying I raised this film above many others because it took a big risk in the technical production and it deserves a look for that reason if nothing else. Secondly it did some home work, which many zombie films could benefit from, and presented a cool back story from the history of Jerusalem. So the technical idea, let's tell a zombie story through google glasses. I thought I would hate this, but actually the longer it went the more comfortable I became and finally enjoyed this. The acting is also pretty good from this young cast and despite having ZERO start power they pull off a pretty cool story about 2 Jewish girls visiting Israel to party and chase men. The ending was especially creative and graphic and the final seen stayed with me for several days. It may be a bit uncomfortable at first, but please give this flick a chance and you may enjoy it.

JERUZALEM PREVIEW