Zombieland Move Review

Zombieland was released on the 7th of October 2009 in the UK, it is a horror/ comedy film directed by Ruben Fleischer . It was produced by the well-known company Columbia Pictures. The film made on their opening weekend £1,240,984 and still making more (worldwide made over $102,391,540), the film was such a great hit they’re making a sequel.

The comedy/ horror is about a timid teenage boy trying to get to his family in Ohio, on the way he meets a crazy middle aged guy trying to find the last Twinkie (Tallahassee), and a pair of sisters (Wichita and Little Rock) trying to get to an amusement park. On the way not everything seems 'normal' and they're joined by unwanted  flesh eating visitors. Which these 'zombies' are more fast moving monsters then slow, not like the zombies in Dawn Of The Dead where they're confused and somewhat cute, these monsters are something you would not like to meet. The director Aeisher said he didn't want to go for Romero's style of zombies because he didn't want to copy other styles, he wanted his own. He wanted less thinking in his zombies and more fury, he also wanted them disgusting and scary, so they searched disease to get different make up effects.

 

The narrative begins by Columbus telling us about the virus related to the mad cow disease and the rules of survival, which turns everyone that is in contacted with the virus, into flesh eating zombies. The Earth's population has only a handful of humans left. In this part of the film they play "Metallica For Whom The Bell Tolls", which shows people in slow motion killing the zombies to get a taster of the film, and to show the destruction in it. This is a perfect song/lyrics to play as it fits the genre very well (parallel music), because the lyrics is about 5 soldiers left to defend a hill and are killed in an airstrike. 

The main person we meet who is a survivor is Columbus (played by Jesse Eisenberg), a timid, nerdish teenage boy who is a student at a university, and has just came back to see his family in his home town. On the way he notices things are a little different and hopes his parents are still alive because people are turning into a "human happy meals". The practical effects are not like the body horror in Dawn Of The Dead but more rough, (like guts ripping out and veins). When he gets home he's quite jumpy from what he has seen (tension rising in this scene as we think a zombie is going to pop out, there is very low key lighting). Instead we hear knocking from the door and it's one of his girl-friends who's been bitten. We notice that Columbus is an outsider, doesn't really talk to many people and don’t know how to react with them (which we see his friend laying on him), but he uses this to get away from zombies (avoiding them).

When Columbus comes back from his home he walks on the highway where he meets Tallahassee (played by Woody Harrelson) driving. Tallahassee is a crazy character killing as many zombies as he can, but to also find a Twinkie, he ends up agreeing with Columbus to take him to Texarkana. On the way they go to a supermarket to find Tallahassee's Twinkies, but instead they encounter zombies, where Tallahassee ends up killing them with any object he can (a guitar in one point, and quite excessive) blood flying up. When exploring the supermarket they end up finding two teenage girls, Little rock (Abigail Breslin) and Wichita (Emma Stone) who are both sisters. Little Rock portends to be beaten so they can rob the guys car to get to Los Angeles, where the theme park is. Columbus and Tallahassee finding a bag full of guns and drive off to get revenge on the two sisters, they end up finding the car broken down. Tallahassee goes to investigate while Columbus stays back just in case of trouble, which the girls are nowhere to be found. Tallahassee comes back to the car and finds the girls are in the backseat, they try and work things out and finally they agree to let them travel. The two sisters make it to the theme park in Los Angeles where it's zombie free, and Columbus was going to leave the sisters to find his family but ends up going back for them. They end up safe and travelling to Hollywood fighting and dodging zombies. Along the way, they use a map of stars to find Bill Murray's house and end up there for awhile. Little Rock has no clue who Bill Murray is so Columbus takes her to Bill's private cinema room to watch Ghostbusters, and to ask questions about her 'attractive sister'.

Tallahassee and Wichita look around Bill Murray's house to find the real and alive Murray. Turns out Billy Murray had survived by faking to be a zombie all this time, which allows him to go to the shops when he wants to. Tallahassee and Wichita decide to play a trick on the little sister and Columbus by letting Murray portending to be a zombie, Columbus catches him right on time and ends up shooting him. After the incident they have a little 'funeral' for Murray and they all get along in his house. Tallahassee finally lets himself go and tells everyone that he lost his son to the zombies, which suggests why he's so angry and full of attitude during most parts of the film, he's lonely and isolates himself from everyone. Wichita and Columbus end up getting drunk and nearly sharing a moment together, until Tallahassee interrupts. The next morning the two sisters leave because they’re scared they might loose each others trust and ends up going to the 'zombie free theme park' a quite creepy location . The two sisters end up turning on all the lights which makes a huge noise and attracts all the zombies near the surrounding areas. The girls are so terrified they end up going on one of the tallest rides where they can stay at the top of the ride to get away from the zombies. Going back to Columbus and Tallahassee, Columbus says he’s going to go after the two sisters while Tallahassee plans to go elsewhere, but agrees to save the girls. At the theme park they see the sisters are in trouble and decides that Tallahassee will distract them while running though the theme park (quick collision cutting and point of view shots in the van when saving the two sisters), but plans don’t go well and Columbus sees his hugest fear...a zombie clown where he has to face his fear in order to save his 'girlfriend'. Things go well and ends up being the hero and saving the two sisters, while the older sister (Wichita) has a moment with him and tell him her real name (Krysta). In this part of the film the most memorable scene is where Tallahassee locks himself in a little fair game box and shoots every zombie around him. Soon after that, Tallahassee goes to a restaurant where he finally finds a box of Twinkies, but the box didn’t survive because he accidentally shot them. The two sisters find them and Little Rock throws him a Twinkie she has found and eats it.

The end of the film they realize that they work well together and make a 'new family' and end up driving off looking for a home together. Which this leaves and open ending for a new film.

This film shows a different range of characters, like at first Columbus is a shy timid teenaged boy, who avoids people, but changes to a hero with the 'bird'. This a common thing for most action films and horrors, teaming up and ending up together, or you always have a maniac who is the 2nd hero willing to kill, a 'attractive' woman that’s in risk and a family member who is in trouble too. In this film there are two final girls who're ready to defend themselves, and get tougher thought-out the film (from stealing a car at first to survive then to killing zombies in the theme park by themselves).

For my own horror trailer I will use my own ideas and do a lot of research on how to make the make up effect decent, and different to other films. I want to also bring in a rememberable part to my trailer, so people will instantly remember that certain part of the film and tell their friends or family about it. I got this idea because watching Zombieland it had so many cleaver, quick moments like Tallahassee on the roller coaster killing zombies, and another part with him locking himself in a sideshow booth. This film knew what appealed to their target audience (genre) to maintain interest, like Thomas Schatz who wrote “Hollywood Genres”.