World War Z

Film Data:

Title: World War Z

Date of Release: June 21, 2013

Director: Mark Forster

Written By:  Matthew Michael Carnahan, Drew Goddard

Genre: Action, Adventure, Horror

Budget: $190,000,000

Gross: $202,351,611

Runtime: 116 minutes

Rating: PG-13

Production Company: Plan B Entertainment, Apparatus Productions, GK Films

Sound Mix: SDDS, Datasat, Dolby Digital

Aspect Ratio: 2.35 : 1

Synopsis:

            The movie begins with Gerry Lane (Brad Pitt) and his wife Karin (Mireille Enos) waking up and having breakfast at home before dropping their two daughters off at school. Gerry was a former United Nations employee but he left his job to spend more time with the family. Soon they get into the car and are stuck in traffic when chaos erupts. A huge crowd of zombies starts attacking the city. These are not regular zombies; these Zombies are fast and it only takes them 11 seconds to change after being bitten. Gerry and his family are able to escape the city and take refuge in an apartment complex with a family where Gerry receives a call from Deputy Secretary- General Thierry Umutoni (Fana Mokoena) who is a friend of Gerry’s from the time he worked for the UN. Thierry is sending over a helicopter to rescue Gerry and his family. The other family refuses to go but unfortunately they are bitten and only the son escapes. The helicopter takes them to a U.S. Navy vessel where there are scientists and military officials trying to see where the outbreak came from. They have an expert Dr. Andre Fassbach (Elyes Gabel) and his opinion is that the plague is a virus and the origin needs to be found so they can develop a vaccine for it. They ask Gerry to go with Fassbach to investigate the outbreak in South Korea and Gerry agrees because if not, him and his family would be kicked off the Navel ship. When they arrive at the base, zombies attack and Fassbach trips and shoots himself accidentally; ending his own life.  Upon entering the base, Gerry is told to go to Jerusalem, where a safe zone had been established before the outbreak hit. Zombies attack as they are leaving and only Gerry and the pilot escape. They arrive in Jerusalem and Gerry meets with their leader Jurgen Warmbrunn (Ludi Boeken) who tells Gerry that a few month before they intercepted something from India which said they had been fighting dead spirits, so therefore, Jerusalem entered quarantine. Due to the noise of the city, while Gerry is talking to Jurgen,, zombies start climbing the wall and eventually come over. 

While trying to escape, Gerry starts noticing that Zombies bypass several people; an old man and a young bald boy. Gerry’s escort, Segan (Daniella Kertesz) is bit by a zombie, and Gerry cuts off her arm, not knowing if it would work. After 11 seconds, she doesn’t change. And they board an airplane that is going to a WHO facility in Wales. All of a sudden a zombie attacks passengers on the plane and people start changing, Gerry is forced to throw a grenade and bring down the plane. Him and Segan are the only survivors even though Gerry is injured by a piece of metal.

They reach the facility but back in New York his family is taken off the navel ship because Gerry hasn’t contacted them and he is presumed dead. When Gerry wakes up, he explains to the scientists that he believes that the Zombies only attack healthy people, thinking back to the old man and young boy, who were probably terminally ill. Gerry offers to inject himself with a terminal but curable virus to see if this is the case. The only problem is that zombies have overrun the wing where the pathogens are stored. They choose to infiltrate it and are able to test Gerry’s theory, proving him right, they are then able to derive a vaccine from it and start fighting to take down the zombies.

Comments:

            Based in the brink of an apocalyptic world, World War Z has one theme that many apocalyptic movies don’t have, hope. I say this because most zombie movies or TV shows for that matter are pretty much based on society adapting to the conditions of living in a world full of zombies, but World War Z is about humans not accepting this tragedy and figuring out how to fix and rid the world of them.

            With movies like Quantum of Solace and Machine Gun Preacher, it is safe to say that Director, Mark Forster was the ideal person for this job. And with an A+ actor like Brad Pitt, this movie was sure to draw in crowds. Having Brad Pitt play the main character was a great marketing strategy on the casting crew’s part. I believe this movie would not have been as successful if the main character would have been an unknown person.

            The fight sequences in this film were superbly done and despite that fact that the zombies were CGI, you would not be able to tell from looking at them. They were so realistic and that was impressive.

            As always, I must talk about the music. English band, Muse, were the frontrunners for this soundtrack and let me tell you, they did a great job creating music that went with the action/horror feel of the movie.


"World War Z." IMDb. IMDb.com, n.d. Web. 18 Nov. 2013. <http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0816711/>.