Movie Review - World War Z

World War Z is a novel by Max Brooks which received good reviews after taking a very original and intelligent approach to the well worn zombie apocalypse story.  The movie rights were purchased by Paramount Pictures in 2006 (the same year the book was published) for use by Plan B Entertainment, which happens to be Brad Pitt's own production company.  After several rewrites filming finally commenced in mid 2011.  Why am I telling you all this spurious trivia?  Read on and find out.

World War Z (the movie) sees a mysterious epidemic sweeping the globe.  Infection is spread by bites and the victims become, you guessed it, zombies.  Gerry Lane (Brad Pitt) is an ex United Nations investigator who had enough of travel to the world's most dangerous hot spots and wants to live in domestic family bliss.  It's not long before he has his first encounter with zombies and a well timed call from his former boss, Thierry Umutoni (Fana Mokoena), gets him and his family to the safety of a naval vessel.  There he finds out the reason for the call.  They want him back in the field to help find the source of the epidemic to see if there is a cure.  If he refuses then he and his family will be sent back to the mainland to face the ever increasing horde.

I am not going to try to compare the events of the movie with the original source material.  There really is no point as the only similarity is the title.  The above history lesson is really just to show that between inception and completion there has been a number of changes.  This is readily apparent in the movie as there are scenes where essentially stuff happens for reasons.  You get the feeling that something more was meant to occur in relation to these events but they are just left there as random scenarios that seem significant but ultimately have no bearing on the story.

But is the movie any good?

World War Z is an exciting movie to watch and there is plenty of intense, if uneven, action.  Also, considering the theme of the movie, it was released as PG-13 in the US (it's an M in Australia) so there is very little blood and none of the normal dismemberment zombie flicks are infamous for.  There is some gore saved for special occasions but there is only one scene that reaches any level of gruesomeness.  It almost makes it a good movie to ease someone into the horror genre... almost.

The zombies are just as uneven.  These aren't your shambling slow menaces, they are lightning fast and super agile with creepy screams and gnashing teeth, except when important characters need to escape, then they drop down a gear and take things a bit easier.  Since this strange phenomenon occurs quite early in the movie some of the tension is lost since it is obvious the main players are never going to be in serious danger.  That's not to say there aren't some tense moments.  It's just that the actual danger seems to be to anyone unlucky enough to be sharing the scene at the time.

Strangely the atmosphere completely changes about two thirds of the way through and the intense pace up to that point just disappears and the movie transforms to a more focused and contained survival horror.  It really feels that the slower paced, claustrophobic atmosphere is what was originally intended before someone said more action was needed.  Strangely the zombies also stop screaming and instead issue this strange squawking sound. It's also worth noting that at this point Doctor Who appears, sorry a W.H.O. Doctor played by Peter Capaldi.

Forget about logic though.  My alternate title for World War Z is "Brad Pitt Saves The World With Sudden Realisations".  There are moments where in amongst all the chaos in the early parts (and the chaos starts in the first 10 minutes) he can keenly notice fine details and retain them which allows him to leap to a sudden conclusion for plot reasons.  If there was a leap of logic sporting event then Brad would be the world champion.  The conclusion his character reaches is just rendered nearly unbelievable because it's that character that comes up with it.  Of course this is really a Brad Pitt vehicle, he is the only major player and everyone else is relegated to supporting cast.  Luckily he puts in a decent performance since everything is riding on his shoulders.

This is not a movie that you should put too much thought into, which is also it's biggest flaw since it appears the original intent was to create something thought provoking and more in the spirit of the original novel.  There is no denying that it is still an enjoyable experience and is a more accessible horror film since even the more squeamish viewers should be able to get through it without too much difficulty.

In a word - sqauwk