Zombieland

It’s a lot of fun, and I love Woody Harrelson in his devil-may-care, toughg-guy role as one of the few human beings alive who isn’t interested in eating another human being; what he craves above all else is Twinkies, and, excuse me, Snowballs won’t do – he doesn’t like coconut – it’s not the flavor, just the texture.

The second role goes to Jesse Eisenberg who does his usual, but brilliant, young Woody Allen fussbudget, angst-driven nerd who survives with a long list of rules, such as “double tap” (you’ll have to see the movie) and “never be a hero.”

Their counterpart is played well by Emma Stone and Abigail Bresslin as two clever, survival-bent sisters, on their way to a west coast amusement park rumored to be free of zombies. While Harrelson plays by his brawn, Eisenberg by his caution, the girls play by their wits and take advantage of male gullibility (sorry guys, that’s the way it is).

In such a world, there can be no intimacy: so names are never used (with one exception in a rare tender moment), so they’re named after their hometowns, or destinations or whatever: Tallahassee (Harrelson), Columbus (Eisenberg), Little Rock (Breslin) and Wichita (Stone). 

The zombies, shades of every Fifties B movie, are ravenously hungry for human flesh – aren’t they all? And though overwhelming in numbers, they’re easy to kill because of their obsession. Hmmm.

This is, in many respects, your typical road movie, within an apocalyptic world. Will they or won’t they? While the two teams seek to undo one another at first, there grows a grudging realization that they might just do better working together.

The film ends at the amusement park amid a pile of dead zombies, and this reflection from Columbus, “If you don’t have friends, you might as well be a zombie.”

For me, the story is a parable of America – have we become a nation of zombies, devouring one another to satisfy an unending ravenous appetite? Has fear taken such a hold that intimacy is impossible? That names, real names, no longer count? And is there a place free of zombies? A safe place for us?

Technically, the film is well done! What can I say. Of course, it’s a B movie, so don’t press it on details (such as, if the world is now filled with zombies, how can the power grid still be working to light the amusement park and run the rides?)

Sure, it’s light entertainment, but it’s fun to watch with a lot of laughs.

See it in the theater? Yeah, I think so.

And be careful of the zombies – they’ll eat ya’ alive!