Movie Review: ‘WORLD WAR Z’

World War Z has finally made it into theaters. For those of you that have been following along the production, you know it has been a hell of a road. Re-shoots, reports of conflict between the director & Brad Pitt and the fact that the film barely has any reference to the book it was based upon. Many felt this was a cash-in on the success of The Walking Dead, which I feel it is. However, World War Z lacks the blood, gore or characterization that The Walking Dead has.

World War Z introduces us to Gerry Lane (Brad Pitt) who has left the U.N. to be a stay at home dad and focus on his family. We really aren’t told what exactly Gerry did at the United Nations but he seems like he made an impression during his tenure because when shit hits the fan, he is demanded to come back and help find the source of the infection. His family is given special care treatment as long as Gerry is alive and globetrotting to find the solution to this whole undead problem.

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The word “zombie” is said a few times but the film treats the Zed-word (I had to throw that in there) more of a force of nature or as a weapon of mother nature – since she is, as one character puts it, a serial killer. Gerry is put into situations right before controlled environments where either the zombies are contained or excluded. When Gerry gets the intel he needs, unfortunately said environments are compromised and the audience is put into an action set piece where Gerry runs around avoiding being bitten.

The film is scripted by three different writers that, judging from the end result, had some different ideas. It seemed like there would be one writer that wanted to focus on the human characteristic more and the struggles Gerry’s family would experience being disconnected from, what seems like, the glue that holds them together as a family unit. While the other screenwriters would separately focus on action set pieces and how to get Gerry from one point to the other.

Brad Pitt plays….Brad Pitt. He’s likable and you know that he cares about his family and would do anything to keep them safe. An interesting aspect that is introduced but not really explored in depth, or at least the depth this reviewer would like it to be, is the human environment when law and order is abandoned. Gerry’s daughter suffers from asthma and she needs an inhaler (btw, since this reviewer has Asthma…please research how an Asthma attack sounds – there is typically weezing not gasping). When Gerry and the family go to a supermarket that is getting looted and picked over, Gerry and his daughter encounter a man with a gun. This scene, without giving anything away, is an interesting dynamic that presents itself a few times in the first third of the film but is abandoned once the globetrotting begins.

Keep in mind, this is not really a zombie film. Sure, it has zombies but like I previously said, they are more of a force of nature until the final act where they are treated like individual zombies. Previously in the zombie film genre, we would be able to identify with some zombie characters. Any zombie film you look at in the past, it is pretty much guaranteed that you will see multiple shots peppered in said film where you get a close-up of a zombie or someone prior to “the bite” and then said person becoming zombified before the attack. That is shown once in the initial scene of infection but never again is it shown. With director Marc Forester choosing to opt out of doing this often, it sort of subtracts any identification with with the zombies. However, that is acceptable as it is because Forester is not looking to create a zombie film. He is looking to create an epidemic film. While World War Z still borrows from elements of successful (important to note) zombie films like 28 Days Later,  in regards to the close quarters Gerry’s family is put in when they enter an apartment building in New Jersey, and Zack Snyder’s Dawn of the Dead, no where does it come close to being a genuine horror film or a action/horror/thriller. What is a bit conflicting is the fact the “zombie” term gets thrown around yet there is no reference to why or how it got thrown around as the story negates any past zombie culture in any form of media. It is to be assumed that there has never been any thing that has tackled the subject of zombies.

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World War Z is an action film. Plain and simple. It is the cinematic junk food that you indulge in every once and a while. The film aspires to be a action-packed thrill ride but feels a bit empty. It even thinks it can borrow from one of the best summer action films in Jurassic Park and get away with it (seriously, tell me the scene in the W.H.O. facility when Pitt gets to his destination doesn’t feel like the zombies are equivalant to the Raptors in Jurassic Park). If you want to save some money, see it in 2D (if available), the 3D isn’t too spectacular.

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