This weekend, Jonathan Levine’s (50/50) zombie romantic-comedy, Warm Bodies, hits theaters everywhere. Though it was bound to happen eventually, it was a movie that actually was piquing a lot of people’s interest when the first trailer dropped and made its way around the net. A zombie with a sense of humor? That would be a first., but a zombie that had the potential to fall in love, now we are getting into unchartered territory that has the potential to be really sweet or really pathetic.
Warm Bodies follows the life of R (Nicholas Hoult), a zombie who can think but who has no idea who he is. He has this ability to grunt a few words with one of his zombie pals M (Rob Corddry) that makes him special amongst the walking dead. There are two types of dead in this zombie world, those who still have their flesh and continue “living” and those that have given up and have torn their flesh off called bonies. Somehow these bonies are faster and stronger than regular zombies but I can’t explain why, they might just be angrier.
One day, while out looking for some fresh human meat, R and his gang of zombies encounter a group of young adults who have ventured outside their city walls to scavenge for medical supplies. While in the process of eating one guy’s brains, R sees Julie (Teresa Palmer), a beautiful girl who he instantly falls in love with and has the need to protect. As the film progresses their relationship begins to blossom and R starts to get warmer, allowing him to communicate better and curb his hunger for human flesh. What happens next between the two may set in motion a series of drastic changes that affect both the living and the dead.
Besides being a zombie who most certainly eats people’s brains, R would best be described as a hoarding hipster. He collects a lot of vintage items which he stores in his airplane home and listens to classic rock and pop on vinyl. Julie on the other hand is a rebellious romantic who can’t seem to stand her father’s over protectiveness and military moral values. Her father, played by John Malcovich, runs the military effort and I believe is the leader of the surviving humans in the walled off city…and he doesn’t like zombies no matter how special they are. You have to look no further than Rob Corddry though as he is the movie’s comedic saving grace, bringing the laughs every time he gets some screen time.
Warm Bodies was a movie I was looking forward to after giving the trailer a chance to prove itself to me. I found the concept really interesting, the fact that a zombie could “speak” and potentially revert back to its human ways out of love was fascinating to me. The film is surprisingly charming and while, at times, it moves as slow as a walking zombie, it’s likeable characters pull you in enough where you care what’s going to happen to them no matter what they’re doing, be it chilling listening to music or hiding from the creepy bonies. Where Levine
really succeeds is having the ability to quickly and effortlessly shift from creepy moments to comedic moments to romantic moments, you don’t even notice how well the transitions work until after you leave the theater, it was really well done.
My main issue with Warm Bodies is that it shows all of the best/comedic parts in the trailer. Seriously. Almost all of the comedic elements from the movie were put into the trailer and that was the biggest letdown for me. The movie is pretty decent for what it is but that element removes almost all of the comedic surprises which were what I was looking forward to the most. SPOILER My other issue is that I’m not sure why a picture that brings back a memory for one zombie would somehow spark the warm feelings in other zombies, it didn’t make sense to me. Also the idea of zombies being able to fight alongside humans boggles my mind since it seemed like most of the zombies in the movie didn’t have the ability to think rationally. END SPOILER
Overall, Warm Bodies was a surprisingly enjoyable romantic comedy that will likely spawn a few copycat films. The film had some really clever, creepy and touching moments but it can also frustrate real zombie fans due to some head scratching scenes that make no logical sense. Basically, I’d categorize it as cute, as everyone understands what that means.
Rating: Shows sparks of enjoyable life but never quite gets the heart beating fully (6/10)
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