 | MOVIE DETAILS • Name: Army of the Dead • Year: 2021 • Country: Australia • Director: Zack Snyder • Main cast: Dave Bautista, Ella Purnell, Ana de la Reguera, Omari Hardwick • Runtime: 148 minutes • Production company: The Stone Quarry • TRAILER
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Army of the Dead (2021) had all the numbers to be considered one of the most expected horror movies of the year. It marks the return of Zack Snyder to the genre of horror after his work on epics, fantasy, and superheroes films that included blockbusters titles like 300 (2006), Watchmen (2009), Sucker Punch (2011), Man of Steel (2013), Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice (2016), and Justice League (2017). But it is also the return to the story and concept that saw his debut in feature films with Dawn of the Dead (2004), that amazing and fast-paced zombie movie he mastered adapting the screenplay written by James Gunn.
I had to admit although the global expectation was high I had very little hope for this movie to be any decent. I adore Dawn of the Dead (2004), and I think Watchmen (2009) is close to being an artistic masterpiece of modern cinema, but I never saw the point with 300 (2006), and everything Snyder did after that I would categorize it as rubbish. Yes, one can definitely say I am on the side of the Zack Snyder haters. But Army of the Dead (2021) is a movie that made me eat all my words.
Forget the last 10 years of Zack Snyder filmography. Sucker Punch (2011) never existed, and those awful DC Comics adaptations must disappear from our memories. Army of the Dead (2021) is a horror and action movie that gives no truce, it is fully entertaining, it is violent and gory, has well-depicted characters, and in some moments it gets to touch your feelings. It is very close to a perfect movie. And it is done by a group of filmmakers that proved to love and respect the genre.
Dave Bautista is one of those performers that due to his wrestling past and his bulk physic it is sometimes hard to take as a serious actor. But those who have seen his work, his little part in Blade Runner 2049 (2017), his role of Drax in the Guardians of the Galaxy saga, or other titles like Hotel Artemis (2018) or Heist (2015), he is capable for sincere performances, as well effective action stunts. And that is the same you can say of the rest of the cast in Army of the Dead (2021), a group of actors and actresses that might be not very well known but accomplish their job with satisfactory results.
Is Dawn of the Dead (2004) better than Army of the Dead (2021)? Well, that is something very hard to say because they are very different. The former is a classic zombies flick, a remake of George A. Romero’s Dawn of the Dead (1978) set in the 21st Century. And the new one is flying free, taking much from action, war, zombies, general horror, and heist movies, and ending up with a personality of its own. They are not even part of the same dimension, two completely different stories and scenarios with zombies as the threat.
Since the first scene, showing the origin of the zombie outcast that devoured the city of Last Vegas, Zack Snyder is decided to break from his last decade of filmmaking. All those Vegas-style songs help to create a personality to be associated with Army of the Dead (2021). A story with a few surprises despite the predictable of the plot. A movie that is not afraid to get bloody when it is required. The return of the Zack Snyder we adored at the beginning of his career for his fearless and always mind-challenging creative style. And with Richard Cetrone, a stunts performer who has collaborated with Snyder in almost all his films, in the role of a loveable evil zombie boss; something very similar to what he did as Big Daddy Mars in John Carpenter’s Ghosts of Mars (2001). Damn, it all works.
I think it is not crazy to say Army of the Dead (2021) is the best zombies movie of the last 10 years. Perhaps, even the best zombies movie since Dawn of the Dead (2004). So, you know, go for it, it’s already on Netflix. You can’t miss it.
RATE: 8/10
IMDB URL: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0993840
