Sommerleigh Pollonais, Horror Head Writer
Plot: Following a zombie outbreak in Las Vegas a group of mercenaries take the ultimate gamble—venturing into the quarantine zone to pull off the greatest heist ever attempted.
Review: Zack Snyder’s remake of Dawn of the Dead is one of my all-time favourite zombie movies. It had heart, it had smarts, and it had style. So how does his return to the world of the undead, Army of the Dead, compare? Well…it has style, I’ll give it that.
Let’s talk positives first. Army is one good looking movie. The visuals are crisp and would look great on any cinema screen, much less for Netflix. Dave Bautista (Guardians of the Galaxy) proves he is more than just a one trick pony as well. The man has range and surprisingly we get to see a lot of it in a zombie movie of all things. Bautista is definitely the best of the bunch here, but the entire ensemble cast (although cliched) are pretty entertaining. Then there’s the R rating which is more than earned here with blood, gore, and body parts galore on display, more than enough to please action horror fans everywhere. Yes, a lot of it is digital (which I hate) but it was executed decently enough for me so I’ll give it a one-time pass.
Sadly while Army of the Dead is entertaining, it’s nowhere near as good as Dawn of the Dead was. It’s a Snyder movie, so we get loads and I mean LOADS of shots where the background is blurry with a lot of close-up shots on the cast. It’s like he replaced his love of slow motion with this instead, but a little goes a long way and I felt like there was too much of it here.
Then we have the plot holes. Cinema Sins is gonna have a field day with this one! From the opening scene we had ridiculous plotlines that lazy writers used to move the story forward. Trained soldiers transporting a classified item, yet they don’t see a pair of headlights coming at them on a dark road? Or how about some people coming back from the dead without being bitten? What exactly are the rules here? Sorry, but stuff like this drives me a bit crazy. Then in usual Snyder form, the movie goes on for way too long. The natural end point came and went but instead we get a whole extra scene that we really didn’t need.
The song choices were a bit bizarre (and one very much on the nose) but okay, whatever. And the opening credits, well, let’s just say Zombieland did it much better and leave it at that.
All said and done, if you go into Army of the Dead never having seen Dawn of the Dead (Snyder’s 2004 reboot, not George A. Romero’s 1978 original) you may find it enjoyable as another okay zombie movie. But as I am a fan of the Snyder’s previous zombie movie I was disappointed as I was hoping for something just as memorable.
Army of the Dead is worth a look, I just don’t see myself rewatching it again any time soon.
Sommer’s Score: 5 out of 10
For more of my thoughts on Army of the Dead you can check out my video review below:
So what did you think of Army of the Dead? And how does it compare to Dawn of the Dead? You can check out more zombified articles below:
Sommerleigh of the House Pollonais. First of Her Name. Sushi Lover, Queen of Horror Movies, Comic Books and Binge Watching Netflix. Mother of two beautiful black cats named Vader and Kylo. I think eating Popcorn at the movies should be mandatory, PS4 makes the best games ever, and I’ll be talking about movies until the zombie apocalypse comes.
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