Brad Pitt in a zombie apocalypse flick? That's either gonna be hilarious, or a looooooooong coupla hours, right? Wrong. People, World War Z could be it - the zombie flick humanity won't be embarrassed to own up to a decade or two from now.
We won't lie - it has its fair share of kitschy moments. Also, it doesn't go anywhere near the sort of existential questions Max Brooks' novel by the same name asks. Why on earth would it need to when it has the better (looking) half of Brangelina shooting up zombies? Hell, we'll watch that bunkum even if it's bad.
WWZ (yeah, that's a thing) is just a lot of undead fun. Here's what happens in the movie. There's a breakout of some virus, let's call it "zombie fever". This isn't just some US-centred apocalypse story. This is about the whole world.
Another name for WWZ happens to be the pandemic war. Now, its upto Gerry (Brad Pitt), from the United Nations, to trot the globe and find a cure.
So, while the whole world is being quarantined, and people are either being walled in or shipped out, Gerry goes from somewhere in China, to Israel (which is now letting in Palestinians, because "everyone we can save is one less of those creatures to fight"), then onto some random World Health Research center, constantly causing havoc in his wake.
But since he looks so pretty as he goes around chopping off limbs, and destroying cities and passenger airplanes, we'll forgive him.
WWZ is a movie that could've become really ridiculous, really easily. Instead, it's a giant film with giant explosions and giant emotions. If you want to watch a B-flick with lots of skin and retarded plot twists, The Hills Have Eyes is more your thing. This here is a sensible movie about zombies (snigger, snigger). No, really.
Also, even though lots of things blow up constantly, there's barely any blood, the violence sanitized enough for a PG-13 rating. You could find yourself craving for a bit more gore, but the plot moves quickly enough that you don't miss it too much.
And then, there's Brad Pitt, who single-handedly carries the whole show. We're guessing, had the makers tried hard enough, they totally could have made do without the rest of the cast. Every other character is nothing more than a plot device, like maybe a chair or a table, to help the story move along.
Have we mentioned how utterly gorgeous it all looks? If you've ever wanted to see the beautiful city of Jerusalem get reduced to a pile of rubble, WWZ is where to do it. Wanna see the same happen to New York? Well, do we even need to say it? How about Mumbai? Well, the guys never showed up in India. Which is rather strange, considering the preventive they found for the "zombie fever". We can't tell you what it is. You'll have to watch the movie for that.
Bottomline: You want to watch this one. In 3D, no less. If only to make up for all the mediocrity you've been dished out this past summer.