Zombieland (2009) Review

Film Title: Zombieland

Year of Production: 2009

Director: Ruben Fleisdner

Genre/Genres: Comedy/Horror

Looking to survive in a world taken over by zombies a dorky college student teams up with an urban roughneck and a pair of drifter sisters.

The opening scene set the tone for the rest of the film effectively because it placed you right in the deep end with the brutality and comedy that the film had to offer. This bluntly introduced almost all the conventions at once, without giving the whole narrative away. This was done by many points on the genre checklist being introduced at this point. This was mostly done by collision cutting. It allowed lots of different techniques to come in quickly, it would go from slow to quick and quiet to loud very often, for instance the very first part of the scene where the camera is simply wandering around while a man is talking and zombie comes out of nowhere and is very loud and picks up the pace; something that is very useful for the comedy/horror genre. Another scene I was impressed with was where the two sisters (Wichita and Little Rock) are introduced and they are perceived to be innocent and one dying. However, these conventions fooled the audience because it quickly changes into them fooling the main protagonists (Columbus and Tallahassee) and stealing their weapons. Both of which ended up being ‘Final Girls’.

This has helped me a lot with understanding the genre because it was bombarded with points from the genre checklist, these included: Close ups as seen on 1minute 7 seconds in, Expressionist Angles as seen on the seatbelt scene, hand-held camera in Columbus’s first chase scene as well as point of view shots and quick editing. There was slow editing when the credits were being shown, collision cutting throughout the opening scene, main theme of threat to yourself and family shown by the girl from next door to Columbus turning into a zombie as well as sex and taboo with the grocery store scene and loneliness and being isolated shown by when Columbus is wondering down the highway alone. There was an open and happy ending with Columbus and Tallahassee going back and pick up Wichita and Little Rock after the pairs went their separate ways, they all go off together into a world taken over by zombies. There was a lot of body horror as well as restricted narration, for example the clown in the final fight scene. Enclosed locations came up often throughout the film but the stand out one was the theme park at the end of the film, low key lighting at the scene of Bill Murray’s death. Parallel music was used in the final zombie fight scene and contrapuntal music was used where Columbus falls off the motorbike. Contrapuntal music was used with the soundtrack ‘For whom the bell tolls’ by Metallica in the opening scene. There was a male hero called Columbus and also Tallahassee could be perceived as a hero too. Slow moving monsters also featured with the zombie for instance the scene where Tallahassee hits one with his door while driving. There are also a few more character types with the Female Victim the woman who dies to a car crash in the opening credits, Female Survivor ‘Little Rock’ and the Final Girl ‘Wichita’, they show this in a scene where they drive off to the faire together, almost riding off into the distance. A strong theme of sadism was portrayed through the film from the zombies. All of these things took place in the film, almost using all of the points of the horror convention checklist. Everything was massively important on the making of the film what it was but I think the most effective factor was the editing. The editing perfectly represented the genre, there was often a lot of collision cutting where there was slow editing to create tension, then it was totally interrupted quick editing creating jump scares. This techniques was also used to emphasise the comedy as in some cases it was deliberately done badly.

For my own trailer, I would like to include a similar use of montage and characters. The editing played with your emotions, at points it sucked you in, then totally reverting the atmosphere of the scene. It allowed the audience to emotionally invest in their interest in the film. Shown by the scene where Columbus and Wichita have a moment where they almost kiss but a break in the romance made it go quite awkward. This is again shown with the characters, they are brilliantly story lined. They have personalities that you can’t help but love; it draws you into their story, allowing you to feel their emotions too. It allows the audience to be more intimate with the characters, making the film seem more personal. My favourite character was Tallahassee, he did whatever he wanted, it was perceived that he only cared about himself but in reality he had the biggest heart out of all of them.

There are not many aspects of the trailer that I could say that I would want to avoid for my own other than the horror was not effective enough. Throughout the film the horror was played down and easy to avoid, so throughout the film you almost forgot it was a horror. For instance in the grocery store scene, when the zombies were coming at the male heroes and they just simply killed them with what seemed like nothing. I believe this was due to the comedy cross-over the film had as they had to make it funny as well as scary, something that I will definitely avoid.

My most enjoyable moment of the film was the part where Todorov’s narrative structure came in to play with the restoration of the equilibrium. This is where the ‘male hero’ Columbus gets the ‘Final Girl’ Wichita, they have defeated the zombies and the love between them has started to flourish. The impact of the characters allowed me to feel involved and happy with this part of the storyline. The happy (open ending) was definitely my favourite part as they drive off seemingly into the sunset like at the end of all romances but they don’t know where they are going and zombies are still out there. I could no doubt recreate this the ‘Hollywood Style Narrative Ending’ providing I didn’t let my characters get lost in the narrative and I engage them with the audience as much as possible.