A mixed group of survivors, including a policeman (Ving Rhames), a nurse (Sarah Polley), a criminal, a pregnant woman, and three security guards, hole up in a mall as zombies take over the world.
Quick Review: It starts so well. Ana, the nurse, and her husband waking up to the zombie child was everything I was hoping this film would be. The initial scenes of the destruction of civilization were excellent as well. But after that it becomes standard fare. It vaguely follows the ’78 version’s plot, though I had a hard time caring about any of these people (or keeping them straight when there is a sudden influx of secondary characters). The nature of the disease has changed (now only the bitten rise), which isn’t a huge problem if you can ignore the existence of the related zombie movies. It does make me wonder about how the disease spread quite so quickly. Far more problematic is the stupidity of the characters. Even if you aren’t quite sure how the disease is spread, if you’ve seen the dead rise and you have reason to believe there is a contagious disease, is it clever to get really close to dead bodies? The film is reasonably well shot, and there are plenty of well made-up zombies and excellent gore scenes, but the themes and humor of the original is gone. There is nothing to think about here; it’s just an adventure horror film, and there are plenty of those to choose from.