Army Of The Dead

"What the hell is this?"

"Valentine."

"Valentine?"

"That's a goddamn zombie tiger..........that's crossing the line."

Oh buddy. You ain't seen nothing yet.

In 2020 in the aftermath of the #metoo revelations Zack Snyder found himself in a bit of a quandary. He was in the middle of post production on Army Of The Dead, a new zombie film with a 90 million dollar budget being made for Netflix, when he found out Chris D'Elia, the comedian playing the helicopter pilot in said film had been accused of grooming and sexually harrassing underage girls. So he did what Ridley Scott did with Kevin Spacey in All The Money In The World. He just removed him from the already shot footage and with a few extra days of filming and some nifty CGI replaced him with the great Tig Notaro, a woman who's also sadly experienced the seedier side of the comedy world. She fits into the film perfectly. If you didn't know the story behind it all you probably wouldn't even notice. You will notice the early scene where a rapist is kneecapped and left as zombie bait though. Hopefully D'Elia gets the point too.

Las Vegas. The fun capital of the world. A newlywed couple's amorous activities have caused it's downfall when they crash into a nearby army convoy transporting what can only be described as a super zombie. Before long the city is under the control of the undead and soon after that the entire place has been walled off leaving only wailing ghouls stalking it's streets. There's a lot of money in the vaults under those streets and a team of mercs led by Scott Ward (Dave Bautista), Maria Cruz (Ana de la Reguera) and Vanderohe (Omari Hardwick) are heading in for a big pay day. Ward's daughter Kate (Ella Purnell ) is along for the ride to rescue a friend of hers and if their plans go the way they should they'll spend the rest of their lives in comfort. The one pressing issue is the fact that the U.S. president has decided to nuke the city and wipe out the zombies. A fact that's making their mission rather time sensitive.

Yes. This is as stupid as it sounds. But there's an awful lot of fun to be had on the ride. Snyder's back in the genre that made his name (his 2004 Dawn Of The Dead remake was really good) and he's having a whale of a time. There's more blood and guts spilled during the opening credits here than in the entire 2004 film. Zombie's creeping flesh is of course no match for concrete saws and 50. calibre weapons in scenes that earn the film it's 18 certificate only 10 minutes in. With the exposition of out the way he slows down, throws in a handful of blunt barbs at the state of present day everything, and lets us take our time to get the know the gang. Not that you'll care one way or the other what happens to most of them, but it's always nice to tell who's who in a film like this. Then he dumps us out onto that famous strip. The budget is all on the screen with Vegas looking more post Apocalyptic than a Temple Bar on a Sunday morning pre covid. The best laid plans of mice and men crumble and the undead hoard gets hungry. Shit gets crazy.

But at nearly 2.5 hours long maybe there's a little too much crazy. Things start to get repetitive. There's only so many times you can enjoy seeing a zombie's brains blown clear out of it's skull. You'll start to wonder why a mission on a timer is taking so long. Why is Snyder throwing in yet another nod to Aliens? (seriously, when the last nod happens you'll probably shout fuck off at the screen). Why the film is delving into the mythology of a beast that's going to be obliterated soon enough. Then you'll smell a franchise in the making. It doesn't really excuse a handful of subplots that come to naught though. Subplots that really give the film a saggy midsection and one in particular will leave a bitter taste near the end. It's good that streaming companies are giving it's filmmakers freedom to make the films they want but sometimes freedom equals bloat.

Thankfully most of the freedom equals fun. There's carnage here that has to be seen to be believed. It's without a doubt the biggest zombie film ever made. One can only imagine the film George A. Romero would have done on this budget. We get running/gunning battles through gore soaked casino's, brutal security measures, zombies on horseback, a neck break for the ages, one on one hand to hand combat scenes that never end well. If you've ever wondered what would happen to a man's head when an undead tiger bites into it you'll find out because there's enough crunch here to satisfy any horror fan. The scenes between father and daughter Scott and Kate shine through the blood surprisingly well too with genuine chemistry between Purnell and Bautista giving us something to hope for. Despite the fact that Dave looks like the gable end of a pebble dashed house he's not a bad actor at all. He's certainly better than most of his 80's and 90's counterparts. Hopefully this film will let him out of Marvel's orbit and into the big solo leagues.

Army Of The Dead is streaming on Netflix from Friday. It's about 30 minutes too long but there's a lot to enjoy here. If you aren't squeamish that is.