Review: Army Of The Dead

Image courtesy of Netflix.

Perhaps coming off the long-awaited release of the four-hour cut of his "Justice League" movie - a version unseen by me - director Zack Snyder felt compelled to stretch out the length of his second zombie movie, "Army of the Dead," which has nothing to do with his 2004 "Dawn of the Dead" remake, a film that remains the director's best work. However, anyone not named George Romero has no business making a two-and-a-half zombie movie, especially one lacking in the type of political or social context for which Romero was known.

As it stands, "Army of the Dead" is a well-enough-made heist movie with a zombie flavor that is also a little on the generic side. Everything from the finale that obviously sets up a sequel to a scene toward the end of the picture that is very similar to the final scenes of the Korean zombie movie "Train to Busan," Snyder's film borrows a little here and a little there.

The film's title sequence is its best moment, and it follows the opening scene in which a newly-married couple engaged in fellatio while driving crashes into an armored military vehicle that is carrying a zombie that moves fast and has more intelligence than your average undead specimen. This occurs outside Las Vegas, which then becomes overrun by zombies in a fun credit sequence that utilizes a remake of "Viva Las Vegas" and squeezes a lot of exposition into the length of a song.

Regardless, the city has a wall built around it and is cordoned off from the rest of the United States. A greedy businessman approaches a former soldier - turned cook - named Scott Ward (Dave Bautista) with a job that involves sneaking into Las Vegas, now overrun with the undead, and stealing hundreds of millions of dollars out of a vault. Ward and his crew will be able to split $50 million among themselves if they pull it off.

Next comes the sequence in which a motley crew is selected for the mission. It includes two soldier pals of Ward - Cruz (Ana de la Reguera) and Vanderohe (Omari Hardwick) - as well as a safecracker who talks too much (Matthias Schweighofer), a zombie killing YouTube star (Raul Castillo), a helicopter pilot (comedian Tig Notaro), a coyote who gets people across the border Nora Arnezeder), an abusive border cop (Theo Rossi) and even Ward's daughter, Kate (Ella Purnell), who is searching for a friend who crossed the border into Las Vegas.

Much of the rest of the film plays out exactly as you'd expect. Betrayals occur. Characters are picked off one by one by the zombies - some of which are slow and others are fast moving and more intelligent like the lead zombie who escaped during the crash at the beginning. The film often feels like a more violent "Ocean's 11" movie... but with zombies.

That's not to say there isn't fun to be had here. The film is stylish and moves at a quick pace, with well-made action sequences. Yes, originality is in short supply here, but the personalities of the cast often rise above the familiar material. It's only toward the end when the film stumbles as it tries to recreate scenes from other films of this type and includes a final sequence that is obviously meant to set up the obligatory sequel. "Army of the Dead" isn't bad - it's just a little too long for a film of this type and it plays like a greatest hits package of better movies of the same subgenre.