Review of Shaun of the Dead (2004) by Greta B — 02 Sep 2013

With so much craze about the zombies, me and my friend decided to watch something not so new, a movie which came out a bit before the zombie fashion. We actually had no idea it would turn out this good.

This movie started out slow and if you're thinking during the first fifteen minutes whether or not you should turn it off, trust me, it gets better. We were literally shouting at the screen and couldn't get away from the screen - the movie was a thriller masterpiece. And it was not like usual zombie movies or Walking Dead when people with no fear kill zombies straight away - these were normal people with no plan, a lot of fear and a wish to survive. So the two friends - Shaun and Ed decide to round everybody up and hide in their favorite bar until everything cools off. Good plan, right? Well the plan always sounds good in theory, but in practice there's usually a lot of mishaps.

It is actually interesting how from the beginning Shaun shows similarities with zombies - how he gets up from bed, his all morning routine is worked out and he does not have to think at all - just follow the schedule. Life seems simple. Actually, when the zombie fever hits, he only notices that when one of them wanders into their yard and even then they think that the girl is just totally wasted and not dead. The realization only comes after they think they killed the girl by accident and then she rises up to attack them. This is quite scary as it shows how people themselves have become zombies or unaware of their surroundings and their activities that they can't recognize what is going on right in front of their eyes. Mike Rugnetta from PBS idea channel was saying (check out his video here - he has great ideas on the zombie topic) that the craze for zombies started out as a fear that technologies will take us over and in zombie apocalypse the only thing you can trust is yourself and your skills. And that is true as none of the technological wonders like cellphones or computers are really helping out when you need to get away from the zombie horde that is chasing you.

But why I loved this movie was because it was funny, sad and a thriller at the same time and because of the ending: the zombies become a part of the civilization, being pets, loved ones (!) or even having jobs. As funny as that sounds, it is quite scary. I mean it is imaginable to be replaced by a machine as civilization grows, but can you imagine being replaced by somebody who's...already dead?