World War Z

 

Given its well publicized production problems, including an out of control budget and an entire third act reshoot, I expected a lot worse from World War Z.  Yes, the storytelling can be sloppy at times, and the movie is never quite as thrilling as it could have been.  But there are still some very nice individual moments throughout.  When all is said and done, though, the movie simply cannot escape its central flaw - It's a rather basic zombie movie with bigger production values than the norm.

The movie certainly wastes no time in getting going, however.  Not five minutes after we meet our lead, an ex-military investigator named Gerry Lane (Brad Pitt), his devoted wife (Mireille Erios), and two cute daughters, chaos erupts on the streets of Philadelphia as a zombie invasion caused by an airborne virus breaks out around the world.  There are some nice tense moments as Gerry and his family are forced to flee the city, loot a store for food and medical supplies, and then find shelter in a friendly family's apartment as they wait for a military friend of Gerry to send a helicopter to pick them up and take them to an aircraft carrier where they'll be safe.  When they arrive on the carrier, Gerry is forced back into duty to search for "Patient Zero", who is believed to be the source of the disease.  He leaves his family behind on the carrier, and heads off on a search that will take him across South Korea, Israel, and Wales.

The movie follows a rather fragmented structure, as Gerry and his team of military support and random survivors explore these far off places, looking for answers.  There are some great moments where director Marc Forster (Quantum of Solace) uses his exotic locales to interesting effect, such as when the zombies pile on top of each other, creating a makeshift tower so they can climb up the side of the wall of a city is Israel.  Unfortunately, these moments are much too far between.  Doubly unfortunate that the Israel sequence I mentioned has largely been given away in the film's ad campaign.  A majority of the film feels cobbled together from any number of zombie apocalypse films, which largely gives the movie a sense that we have seen it all before for the most part.  And when your summer blockbuster reportedly cost around $200 million to make, the last thing you want your audience saying is that they've seen it all before.

That's not to say World War Z doesn't work at all.  In fact, the entire third act, which features the characters sneaking about a zombie-infested medical wing, is probably one of the tensest moments of any movie so far this summer.  If the entire film had been able to match this level of suspense, it'd be a sure-fire winner.  But, it unfortunately comes at the tail end of a roughly two hour film.  To get to that moment, we have to sit through far too many scenes where the zombies simply chase the heroes endlessly, or perform tired jump scares.  I think the problem lies with the zombies themselves.  As movie monsters and villains, they're probably the least interesting.  And let's face it, pretty much everything you can do with a zombie has been done.  When you're stuck with zombies as your primary villain, your options are unfortunately limited, unless you go for a more comedic approach like Shaun of the Dead or Zombieland.  Unfortunately, this movie is deadly serious.

There's another big reason why the film runs into trouble, and that's the rating.  Due to the massive budget, the studio insisted on a PG-13 rating, so more people could see it.  That means that a film that was clearly designed for adults and to be rated-R has been hacked and edited of any edge it might have had.  All the violence is kept mostly off camera, or with clever editing and quick cutaways.  I'm not saying that if it were more violent it would suddenly become a better movie, as it certainly wouldn't.  It's just distracting to see the jarring cuts and shaky camera work used to cover up the gore.  I find it irritating when movies obviously intended for adults have been sanitized just for a slightly bigger box office turn out.  Why go through all the trouble of editing and blurring out the violence, just so you can make some extra bucks off the DVD sales by offering an "unrated" version?

 

World War Z is well-made in a technical sense, but the performances, the characters, and the plot left me cold.  I was never involved, and never found any reason to root for Gerry or any of his supporters, since we know so little about them.  This has all the earmarks of a star vehicle project that went over budget and out of control.  And while it's not the total disaster it could have been, it's a long way from being salvaged.

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