World War, Puhleese!

If the zombie apocalypse ever comes to pass, would you trust a renowned stupid head with a missing sensitivity chip to save the world? I know I wouldn't. That's one of the reasons I decided to watch World War Z because I knew it was going to be a mess, and what a mess it was.

Brad Pitt plays Gerry Lane a former investigator for the UN who gets pulled back in when the zombie apocalypse breaks loose. Pitt looks more like an aging male model with his styled just so, long, greasy, stringy hair and jaunty blue man scarf rather than someone intelligent enough to work for the UN. I guess he could have had a job at the UN cafeteria or as a janitor but not as high ranking employee. As usual Pitt looks as though he smells of three day old taco meat and sweaty onions he has a look in his eyes that calls more to mind of someone with diarrhea induced IBS trying to find the bathroom just in time rather than someone who has enough smarts to investigate one of the Mystery Gang's many cases. Thanks to his UN connections the UN sends a helicopter to save him and his family, well that's if they can survive the night, to be taken to a safe place. This how stupid Gerry is, he thinks that they're just saving him and his family because he used to work for the UN but they want him to work for them again to help solve the case of the world wide zombie epidemic. He's blackmailed into helping a young virologist track down the origin of the virus. He either helps or Gerry and his family must get out. So off to a US army base in South Korea they go where it's believed the crisis began because the military received an email from there that included the word "zombie". 

Our young virologist is fresh out of Harvard and only 23 years old. The writers are kind enough to give him a speech on how mother nature is a serial killer begging to get caught right before they kill him off. Luckily for Gerry the soldiers on the army base have imprisoned an ex CIA agent who shares some secrets with him. He sold guns to the North Koreans for protection from the zombies and that the North Korean government pulled all of their citizens teeth. No teeth, no bite-y, no zombie, no die-y. He tells Gerry that the Israeli's built a giant wall around their country so go there and talk to them. 

In Israel the head of the Mossad explains that they overheard a communique that the army in India were fighting zombies, so they investigated and things checked out, so they built a wall. The Israeli government is even letting people into the country, that way there are less zombies to fight. 

Don't go patting the Israeli government on the back, the idiots hold a sing along loud enough for the zombies to hear and this happens...

Great Wall of Z

The zombies join forces, climb over one another and climb the wall to get to the other side. So long Israel, you are now officially done for and we will finally have peace in the middle east. Sort of. 

Now World War Z starts cribbing off of a script from The Walking Dead. A young Israeli solider named Segan is helping to escort Gerry to the safety of his military plane, during a frantic race to keep ahead of the implausibly fast zombies, she gets bitten on her hand. So Gerry pulls a Rick Grimes and chops off her hand. They decide to find a research facility *cough-Walking Dead season one episode six CDC visit-cough* because Gerry thinks he knows how to buy humanity enough time to fight back. 

The zombies of World War Z are the same kind of zombies from 28 Days Later, super fast and strong. I personally prefer my zombies the old fashioned slow and decaying way ala Night of the Living Dead. But that's just me. 

This movie is definitely not slow in pace, the action starts about 15-20 mins after it starts and really doesn't let up, sure we get some quiet scenes but thankfully they don't drag them out. No time for character building here. And that's a problem, when Gerry's daughter has an asthma attack you just don't care. I'm sure other people felt the same way I did in that I just wanted that scene to end. I didn't care if she bit the big one, just make it stop! I couldn't even tell you the name of Gerry's wife his one daughter or the sacrificial lambs that lie in his wake. Most of the characters in the film didn't even get a name and if they did I couldn't make them out. I guess that's one way to build a wall of detachment  between your characters and your audience, just don't name them. Even if I did know their names, I still wouldn't have cared about their deaths, they were like plain white paper dolls, lacking in personality, easy to tear apart and 100% disposable. Lastly and this is my biggest gripe, I watched the unrated version and for the life of me, I couldn't figure out what was so graphic or upsetting about it that warranted an unrated warning. Sure it's violent, it's a film about the apocalypse so there will be some blood and a lot of deaths, but there was very little gore. 

It was nice to see that Brad's wife made a special guest appearance, an uncredited one though.

So if and when the zombie apocalypse comes and you have a choice between going with team Brad or team Rick, always go with team Rick. Rick and his group know what they're doing and get it done and unlike aging pretty boy Brad, they don't need a military escort, they had to figure it out for themselves and they did, that's just how badass they are.