sponsorlink
  • Home
  • Podcast
  • Interviews
  • Reviews
  • Movies
  • TV
  • Games
  • Comics
  • Tech
  • Geek
  • About

Movie Review: ‘Warm Bodies’

by Nat Almirall, Feb 2 2013

wb

Is this a parody or a ripoff? Warm Bodies is so up front with its copies — copies– of Twilight that, judging from the trailer alone, by the time it hit theatres, I was sure it had to be a straight-up uppercut to tweener romance. I’m not so sure now.

But I am certain that the leads, Nicholas Hoult and Teresa Palmer, were chosen for their resemblances to Robert Pattinson and Kristen Stewart (respectively, I think), both in looks and in their mutual tendency to overact. The story, however, is lifted from Romeo and Juliet and Zombies — and at least anyone who has yet to take freshman literature should be able to make the connection between Juliet and Julie (Palmer) and R (Hoult) and Romeo. That gets a pass though, since Shakespeare probably stole the story from somewhere else.

Anywho, Julie and R live in your standard zombie apocalypse. A big wall separates the humans from the Corpses (as they’re so called). And there’s a special subset of Corpses called “Bonies” (feel free to giggle like a high-school freshman who has yet to read Romeo and Juliet yet) — these are the folks who’ve decomposed to the point of full-on skeletalization. Somehow they’re still able to move and sniff, but there’s more than a few suspensions of disbelief.

Julie’s father, General Grigio (John Malkovich), commands the free humans, and apparently all the young’ns are required to go out into the city and scavenge for supplies. On one raid, Julie’s current beau gets thwomped and eaten by R, who, although he cannot pronounce polysyllabics, nevertheless has a continuously running inner monologue. R kidnaps Julie and takes her back to his zombie-lair — an abandoned airplane that has more legroom than any plane likely to be in existence. Also, a turntable and the kind of record collection a hipster who dislikes the classics would still have out of principle.

R doesn’t want to eat Julie, however, he just wants to Bonie her, which is the kind of thing zombies apparently want after eating a girl’s boyfriend’s brains. Part of the reason being that in this universe the zombies can acquire the memories of people after eating their brains. Nevermind that these memories are never from the perspective of the individual; it’s always the back of the head or directly in front. And different parts of the brain yield different memories — it’s like those Harry Potter jellybeans! New recollection with each bite!

So Julie at first tries to escape, finding herself surrounded by zombies. R shows up for the rescue, telling Julie to act like a zombie to fool the rest. She struggles with it, which is odd seeing as how five minutes earlier she was walking with R through a horde of them during her abduction, but forget that. And by the way, “R” can’t remember his original name when Julie asks him, but he does recall the letter it started with, so they just stop at that.  That’s how he got his name.

As R’s attraction to Julie grows, he grunts out a lie that it’s not safe for her to leave yet. Cut to the next day, where they’re joyriding around the airport in a lovely BMW convertible. Why she can’t take off in it isn’t explained since the zombies can’t move that fast. Except when they want to. That’s also not very clear. Nor is the way zombies’ hearts work when, well, that’s a spoiler, which is too bad because the movie has a very clever twist in the second half that actually covers new ground within the genre. It also doesn’t dwell too long on the usual complications, another nice touch.

Despite all the logical inconsistencies, the way it tries to include every camera technique from flashbacks to split-screens like a demo reel (Jonathan Levine, if you’re reading this, after 50/50 I trust you can do damn near anything), the way it tries to joke around with abrupt halts in music and action, and my constant snarky asides in this review, this really isn’t so bad.

Hoult especially overdoes the zombie bit (and relishes in the fact that being a zombie lets him be all wide-eyed and pouty-lipped), but he’s sort of like Slim Pickins in Dr. Strangelove — no one told him what kind of movie they’re making. I wish I could say that’s intentional, but probably not. Whatever. I did have fun with this, and there’s an undercurrent of silliness to every deficiency. I think it’s aware that it’s trying to mimic a formula, and if you could accuse the film of it, it’d just grin. It’s not outright self-mocking, but it’s not so serious as to scold you for laughing.

Share this:

  • Click to share on Facebook (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on Twitter (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on Google+ (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on Pinterest (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on Reddit (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on Pocket (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on Tumblr (Opens in new window)

Related

Posted in: Comedy · Drama · Movies · Reviews · Romance · Summit Entertainment
Tagged: Analeigh Tipton, Cory Hardict, Dave Franco, Isaac Marion, John Malkovich, Jonathan Levine, Nicholas Hoult, Rob Corddry, Summit Entertainment, Teresa Palmer, Warm Bodies
You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.



Click here to cancel reply.

Care to Comment? Cancel reply



Listen to Stitcher

Follow us @TheFlickcast
Find us on Facebook


rss Subscribe via RSS
microphone Subscribe via iTunes

Recent Articles

  • The Flickcast 346: Your Comfortable Coat
  • The Flickcast 337: Guess We’re Back
  • Stan Lee Box: Unboxing!
  • How Did Hawkeye and Black Widow Meet in the MCU?
  • The First ‘Iron Fist’ Trailer Is Pretty Great
  • The Flickcast 336: We’ve Arrived
  • The Flickcast 335: Knowledge Is Power
  • The Flickcast 334: The Force Is With Us
  • More articles ...

Podcast Episodes

  • The Flickcast 346: Your Comfortable Coat
  • The Flickcast 345: Ice and Fire
  • The Flickcast 344: Winter Is Here
  • The Flickcast 343: Spinning A Web
  • The Flickcast 342: Gotta Light?
  • The Flickcast 341: We’re Mary Poppins
  • The Flickcast 340: Just Breathe
  • The Flickcast 339: The Flickcast Wakes
  • More episodes ...





3D 20th Century Fox ABC Action Activision AMC Android Animation Announcements Apple Avatar Avengers Batman BBC Blu-Ray Box Office Call of Duty Captain America Casting Chris Evans Chris Hemsworth Chuck Comedy Comic-Con Comics Community DC dc comics Deadpool Disney Doctor Who Drama DVD E3 Fox FX Game of Thrones Games Google Green Lantern HBO Horror iOS iPad iPhone iPhone 4 Iron Man iTunes Joss Whedon Kick-Ass Lost Marvel Marvel Studios Microsoft Mobile Movies NBC Netflix News Nintendo Paramount PC Games Playstation 3 Podcasts PS3 Reviews Robert Downey Jr. Robert Kirkman Ryan Reynolds San Diego Comic-Con Sci-Fi SDCC SDCC10 Smallville Software Sony Spider-Man Star Trek Star Wars Superman SyFy Tech The Avengers The Office The Walking Dead Thor Trailer Trailers TV TV recap Twilight Video Video Games Warner Bros Wii Wolverine X-Men Xbox 360 YouTube Zombies





Advertising and Sponsorship

If you have a product or service you'd like to advertise on The Flickcast website or podcast or want to sponsor one or more episodes of the show, please contact us via the info below.


Contact Us

Got questions, comments, suggestions, want to send us stuff or just need attention? Drop us an email:

info [at] theflickcast [dot] com

For more contact methods, go here.


Copyright © 2009-2018. All rights reserved.


Site designed by Robert Palmer | Powered by Media Temple

Who We Are

The Flickcast brings you the best geek stuff. Find out more about us here.