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Without further ado, a full synopsis-review (that means SPOILERS) of The Good, The Brad and The Zombies:
The credits roll with ominous hints of environmental pollution, clips of violence, angry monkeys and people acting peculiarly, all over the world. So pretty much the standard intro sequence for every zombie action movie for the last 20 years.
Then we meet Brad Pitt and the Brady Bunch, Brad is ex-UN investigator (Angelina would be so proud) who has experienced “The Most Hostile Environments On Earth”(TM) – but now prefers to stay at home and make pancakes for his kids.Â
As the family eat their pancakes (I’m surprised Brad didn’t pick up more orphans during his UN days) violent images flicker through on the TV. Martial law has been declared in India.
As Brad drives his family through the streets of Philadelphia, the traffic becomes dead-locked. The tension builds as pedestrians begin to flee down the side walks. A police officer orders Brad back into his car, only to be hit full force by a speeding truck moments later. Brad makes the snap decision and follows in the wake of the truck as it carves a path through the traffic. Sadly, moments later, after a traffic collision, the car is upside down in the middle of the road and Brad’s walking hamstring of a daughter is having an asthma attack.
The Brad-y Bunch
Brad watches as a man is attacked (and presumably bitten, it was quite difficult to tell as he thrashes around in the road about 200m away). For no apparent reason Brad has the prescience of mind to count the seconds it takes the man to become infected. Why would he do this if he didn’t know anything about the zombie infection? Don’t count the plot holes. Seriously. Just go with it.
Brad leads his family to a camper van and they head out of Philadelphia. He makes a call to the UN Deputy Secretary General, Thierry Umutoni, who agrees to arrange a helicopter extraction for Brad and his family – but this is not an act of unselfish generosity, they need Brad!
The family travel into Newark to get asthma medication for their dead weight daughter. Inside the store we see more signs of the breakdown of society, as shelves are ransacked, two guys attempt to kidnap Gerry’s wife (for no apparent reason) and a police officer ignores Gerry’s shooting one of the assailants, instead gathering jars of baby food. When the family return to the parking lot their camper van has been stolen, what a surprise.
The break down of society – now with shopping carts
As a crowd of swarming zombies attack, Gerry and his family flee to an apartment building where they are given food and shelter by Tomas and his family. The helicopter eventually arrives, Gerry advises the family to come with him but the man of the house decides they would be safer remaining where they are. His definition of ‘safe’ apparently being locked inside an airless room with little food and hordes of marauding zombies outside. After Gerry leaves, zombies arrive at the apartment and proceed to give the door a damn good kicking.
Gerry and family are attacked on the stairs to the roof, with some truly unbelievably good fortune, Tomas has some how managed to escape the tiny flat (which must have been flooded with zombies), run through the corridors (zombies), up the stairs (more zombies) and reached Gerry (who is fighting zombies).
They all reach the roof where Matthew Fox (blink and you’ll miss him) sniper-rifles the attacking zombies and loads Gerry, family and newly adopted son (that’s more like it Brad!) onto the helicopter.
Within mere moments of meeting Brad this boy became an orphan, sound familiar?
They fly to a US navy vessel off the coast, where they are assigned 5 bunk beds and subjected to the bitching of the grunts, who don’t want to share their food with no god-damned civilians. Sorry – who are you supposed to be protecting again?
Brad is blackmailed into helping deliver Dr Fassbach, a nerdy virologist, to the outbreaks ‘source.’ For some unknown reason this is in South Korea. Despite the outbreak of the apocalypse, Gerry’s wife doesn’t want him to go. Presumably she wants him to stay aboard and make pancakes. But go he must – because other wise the Brady Bunch will be kicked off the ship. Brad isn’t bothered about the millions of people who are dying, the break down of society, the hopelessness of the situation – so long as his wife and two brats are safe. Talk about ignoring the big picture Bradley.
The Brady Bunch arrive at their new home with their latest addition
During the flight Dr Fassbach gives Gerry the standard ‘science-talk.’ Upon disembarking the soldiers are immediately attacked by zombies. Fassbach runs back on to the plane – trips – and shoots himself. I assume this moment was meant to shock the audience into thinking “oh my god! I can’t believe they killed the scientist! They’re all doomed!” In actual fact the audience thinks “eh? What just happened? Was that the scientist? Did he fall over? I can’t really see. Oh, Brad says he’s dead…he shot himself? What – by accident?!” Rather than being horrified, as we would if had he deliberately shot himself in a moment of panic – this weird death scene is confusing and leaves you thinking “well that was a bit pointless” and also “Brad is really shit at his job.” He had one mission. One. Protect the scientist. The scientist is dead within two minutes of getting off the plane! You’re shit Brad!
Epic failure imminent
Even though Brad has totally FAILED his mission he decides to continue with the investigation. Just what a totally useless former-UN investigator thinks he can achieve is beyond me.
Anyway – inside the base we get a bit of back story. An army medic came back to the base infected with something, it took him about 20 minutes to become infected and then he started attacking his patients. The shoulders introduce Brain to the smouldering remains of the infected. A head shot wasn’t enough for these guys and unburned flesh still twitches amongst the ashes.
Batshit crazy CIA operative, aka reliable source of information
Then we meet a prisoner at the base – former CIA operative Gunter Haffner – who is as mad as a box of rabid frogs. Â He tells the charming tale of how North Korea has escaped the zombie plague – every inhabitant was forced to remove their teeth with pliers, as he has done. Cue a nice big gummy smile just to prove it! He then tells Gerry to go to Jerusalem to discover why the Israeli’s had foreknowledge of the coming zombie apocalypse. Gerry displays his usual sound judgement by following the advice of the barking mad loony.
As they return to the plane, Gerry gets two more soldiers killed, as his wife tries to return his call via satellite phone and alerts the local zombie population. Seriously – you couldn’t switch your phone off? You really think it was a good time to call your wife – just before you landed at an army base surrounded by zombies?
So Brad and his pilot (everyone else is dead) fly to Israel. Here Brad meets the leader of Mossad, Jurgen Warmbrunn. He explains that Israel intercepted a message from India, regarding soldiers fighting the undead. After a bit of unbelievable guff about the Jews being ultra-cautious with regards to any perceived threat (tin foil hats at the ready guys?) he explains that they are now a happy-hippy commune, where everyone (except zombies) is welcome.
Your country needs you – to stop ‘helping’
The happy jubilant singing of united Israeli’s and Palestinians agitates the zombies, who go bat shit crazy in their attempts to climb the walls until, bodies piled upon bodies in an amazing pyramid formation, they finally make it inside.Sorry Mossad – that’s what happens when you give help to Gerry ‘The Jinx’ Lane. I don’t know – is there some meaning to this? Israel and Palestine finally end  their differences and unite, only to be over-run with zombies? Is this Gerry’s way of ensuring the peace lasts? A big helping of irony?
His escort Segen gets bitten, Gerry promptly lops off her arm, counts to 12 and declares her saved! He also notices and old man and an emaciated bald boy who are ignored by the zombies, hmm…I wonder if that could be significant.
I didn’t know Sinead O’Connor was in Mossad!
Gerry flees the carnage aboard a civilian flight which had been trying to land in formerly safe Israel. I don’t know how the plane had managed to circle the earth for the 2+ days since outbreak – without needing to refuel – but there you go. A few bottles of vodka and a first aid kit and Segen is good to go. Gerry convinces the pilot to take him to the nearest World Health Organisation research facility. Which is in Cardiff. Wow – seriously? The nearest WHO installation to Israel is in fsking Wales?!
Well because this is Gerry The Jinx, there is a zombie outbreak on the flight and as a result the plane crashes in the valleys (looked suspiciously like New Zealand to me). Thanks for sprinkling the infected across the British countryside Gerry – you inconsiderate prick. Oh and Segen survives. Big whoop.
Zombies on a plane
At the instillation he meets Malcolm Tucker Peter Capaldi and some Italian. He phones the UN guy and discovers that, upon receiving greatly exaggerated reports of his death, his family were promptly kicked off the Navy vessel and shipped to Nova Scotia. The horror! Nova Scotia!!!
This useless UN grunt then proceeds to inform the scientists that he’s figured out a solution: the infected don’t bite people who are already ill! Because they wouldn’t make good hosts. I will neatly side-step the myriad of plot holes here.
I couldn’t find a pic with Peter Capaldi
The only problem is that all the diseases are stored within a zombie infested section of the research facility. Brad sneaks in, injects himself and strolls back out again. Nobody died – amazing! He then trots off to Nova Scotia for a touching reunion with his family and a voice over declares that this is just the beginning.
I am reliably informed that the novel which this is based on is really quite fabulous and that this is a decent stab at adapting a book which reads like a very exciting UN report. I also really like J. Michael Straczynski and I’m familiar with his projects. I know he doesn’t settle for simple story telling, there is always a subtext, theme or thorny issue to be addressed. That’s not done with much subtlety in this film, and the main character feels forcibly based upon Brad Pitt’s notion of the ideal action hero. I will read the book as soon as possible (it’s on my list!) but until then it is hard for me to judge some of the films aspirations.
One of the few zombies you see up close NB. distinct lack of blood
But this is, however, primarily an action film. For a zombie movie it is surprisingly light on zombies. That might sound odd when you’ve seen the massive host of infected piling themselves into undead siege engines but that’s exactly the point. These zombies are not a lumbering, festering nightmare of the traditional era or even the crazed, rampaging terrors of the last 10 years. They are more like a plague of locusts or a battering ram. And they feel peculiarly sanitised. Rarely will you see a zombie close-up, instead you are subjected to the CGI masses swarming across the globe. On the rare occasion you actually see a real zombie (you know – a human being in make-up?) they look so clean. There is no blood in this film. And what are the infected actually trying to do? Eat people? Bite them? Kill them?
There are some intriguing hints about this disease and where it came from but for the most part they remain unexplored. It’s outbreak at the army camp and its origins in India merited far more investigation, even some flashbacks or archive footage. Instead we zip from one set piece to the next as ‘the science bit’ is delivered at breakneck speed. As usual lessy fluffy character exposition and more back-story would provided a much more interesting film. You expect me to care about the Brady Bunch while the whole world goes to hell? For some reason the struggles of one man and his family while the rest of the world goes to hell in a handcart appears to be the order of the day in American post-apocalyptic thrillers, but they always leave me feeling cold.
less pancake making, more zombies please
And while it is a very tense and exciting experience, it’s light on any real horror or chills. This is the zombie film taken squarely into the big action movie block-buster genre, with both feet planted squarely in the post-apocalyptic sub-genre. But this is less 28-Days-Later and far more The Day After Tomorrow, with all the daddy-issues and moralising present but (thankfully) diluted. Think Will Smith’s I Am Legend or Tom Cruise’s War of the Worlds and you get the general idea.
And I know this is fake and old but it still makes me chuckle. Although I find the swan diving zombie just as amusing:
Virtual Borderland 
I thought they said that was the only place that was confirmed as still being active?
This is a mish-mash of a film. A largely enjoyable romp if you switch your brain off. Some of the key events from the book are satisfactorily recreated here but too much is left out. Sadly though, a lot of thought went into the book and far too much was not translated into the film – things that it really could have done with.
North Korea’s lack of infection is explained rather well in the book, it is to do with the mass of almost impenetrable rivers to its north and the demilitarised zone to its south (which makes both borders easy to defend).
I really will read the book, I imagine it will be very similar to Zombie Apocalypse – only less quirky. I must have missed the ‘active’ part, as the whole time they were on route to Wales, Brad was still grumbling about whether the installation would still be functional.
I think I was more forgiving of WWZ because I had just sat through Pacific Rim so the bar had been artificially lowered. I’m going to have to review this again once I’ve read the book.
Wow, another film I won’t see (was on the fence and waiting for it to be on cable TV).
The book IS really quite good – a must read for you (NOT the author’s previous book, though, which is tedious). The format is like a colleciton of short stories from the points of view of various survivor’s, with the course of the war hinted at as various people recount their successive experiences to a UN “oral historian”. Several of the stories [chapters] really stayed with me: there’s one from an executive from a pharmaceutical company hiding out in a bunker in Antartica because his company offered a [fake] vaccine that was touted as preventing zombification, another about how the U.S. army made a last in New York before being overrun, an ingenious one about a family that heads up into Canada (because zombies freeze solid during the winter out in the open – duh! – only to run out of food and resort to cannabilism, and so on. The mention of India in the film is doubtless a nod to the famous Indian general in the book who invents the military tactics to successfully repel large zombie attacks (but is also not a story itself – only referred to in various stories).
What is especially annoying is that the film felt the need to come up with some quasi-deus ex machina way of saving mankind, like War of the Worlds (except that approach was actually fresh a century ago). In the book, humanity is saved because humanity reorganizes, makes the hard choices it needs to, and uses its collective determination and intelligence to beat back the mindless hordes, not bcause some guy figures out that people already sick won’t become targets.
The book sounds just my sort of thing. I definitely will be reading it and then most likely writing a follow up comparison.
The film, produced by Brad’s own production company, just felt like a vehicle for him and his personal ideals from the beginning. The characterisation of Gerry Lane is delivered with all the subtlety of a sledge hammer.
With the release of early script adaptations, people were talking about possible Oscar nominations and other such crazy nonsense. The whole film felt like it had lofty ideals – but it never came close to reaching them. It suffers from all the usual problems associated with book adaptations and the peculiar moralising common in all post-apocalyptic action dramas. It was enjoyable overall and certainly tense but also frustrating and it certainly didn’t live up to its potential.
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At the end of World War Z, just as the credits began rolling, a gentleman, scratch that, an idiot spoke up from the back of the theatre exclaiming, “What? That sucked! The book was nothing like that! Booo!” I’m sure he scurried away back home, logged online, and began tweeting, posting, and blogging, furthering his rant. Much like my response to him at the theatre, I hope he receives silence in return.
It’s true, World War Z is nothing like the book. The book is told from the point of view AFTER the war. It’s a “historical,” account of what happened during the war. Rather than make a mockumentary with flashbacks, which would have been the wrong decision in my opinion, the filmmakers decided to put us right in the middle of the action.
When adapting a piece of literature it is impossible to bring every page, every paragraph, every nuance onto the screen. Some have come close depending on the material, but for the most part, they all have to take their own creative licenses. After all, it’s called an “adaptation,” for a reason, otherwise they would call it a copy or mimic.
Where World War Z works (that’s a mouthful) and where so many others fail is that just because the world slips into total and utter chaos, doesn’t mean that governments, military, and law enforcement agencies go away. Quite the opposite. If anything, these scenarios bring out the best of all of them. We see generals, UN delegates, and scientists trying to solve complex issues that they don’t know anything about. Rather than going into hiding, they act. Society doesn’t crumble. Bands of cannibals and leather strapped gangs don’t patrol the streets with necklaces made of teeth. People do what they can to survive, and the higher ups try their best to find a fast and effective solution.
At first, I thought the movie started too fast. How could something this violent and concentrated go undetected, but after a while I got it. The opening montage of news reports said it all. How many of us listen to everything we hear on the news? Exactly. So much goes undetected while we focus on issues that effect us immediately. It’s too late when the virus touches US soil. Not even social media can keep up with it.
As far as zombie movies go this one is pretty great. Though I think 28 Days Later takes the cake in terms of realism, in-camera effects, and sheer terror, this one holds its own. Brad Pitt plays a former UN investigator who is traveling with his family just as the zombie attack on Philadelphia unfolds. The film goes from 0-60 before you take a sip of your Coke. This is a fast paced, edge of your seat thrill ride led by one of the finest actors of this generation (Pitt’s acting ability is far too underrated and lost in the kerfuffle of tabloid news).
For those of you who stare at the ticket window debating whether or not to see a film in 3D or standard, you might want to spend the extra few dollars to see this one in 3D (I know it’s asking a lot, but maybe you can sneak some candy or a bottle of water to offset the concession stand price – deal with it). I tend to air on the side of “screw it, I want to see it in 3D.” Now not every movie NEEDS to be seen in 3D, hell there are really only a couple that absolutely have to be seen in all three dimensions (Avatar and maybe Life of Pi), but this one really surprised me. 3D is not about things jumping out at you, but it’s about layers. Luckily this film has both. Big chase scenes in Philly, particles floating about in South Korea, and tracking shots in Jerusalem make this one of the 3D events of the year. No exaggeration.
Like so many other summer blockbusters before it, civilization is on the brink of extinction and only a handful of experts can save us. What World War Z does that so many have failed is give us hope. Hope that humanity won’t dissolve into nothingness. In the face of sheer danger these fighters stand tall, take a deep breath, look the enemy in the eye, and say, “No.”
More about the movie you can also find it here
http://movieinfodb.com/en/movie/72190/World+War+Z-2013
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