World War Z (Movie)

           World War Z takes place sometime in the near future when there is a zombie outbreak. Brad Pitt, a retired United Nations Investigator, is living with his family in Pennsylvania (although it vaguely looks like New York and it doesn't take them long to travel to New Yorks surrounding areas) when the outbreak occurs. He then flees to an army ship where he is convinced to reenlist and help find out more information about the virus. For your sake, I will not reveal anymore of the plot for this movie.

            This movie, like most Brad Pitt movies, is lacking severely in the most important ways; yet still manages to be a great summer film. There is little, if any character development or backstory. In the course of one conversation, we are supposed to care about Brad Pitt's family and root for them to survive this horrible act. For all I know, these children are the twin girls from the Shinning and need to be put down. This movie also severely over estimates the good of humanity. Maybe this is my personal bias coming out, but all the people in this film seem to be good people who are willing to risk their safety to help others. There is one scene that shows the horrible things people are capable of in horrible situations but other than that everyone seems to be William Wallace. Lastly, there are serious plot holes in this movie. According to Max Brooks, who wrote World War Z and The Zombie Survival Guide: Complete Protection from the Living Dead, once someone is infected with the Zombie Virus they can survive for 20 hours and do not reanimate until 23 hours. Of course, Max Brooks does admit that this time line depends on the person and can change up to several hours on each side. Yet in the movie, it seems that reanimation occurs in 10 seconds or 1 hour (depending on if they are getting on an airplane in the near future or not). I acknowledge they can change the timeline a little bit depending on the person but if something can kill you in 10 seconds, no one can survive for even half an hour without immediate medical attention.

            Before you decide that you should not see this movie from my explanation of its negative aspects, I have to say I strongly recommend this movie. This movie is very fun and Brad Pitt does a great acting job, it isn't the best I have ever seen but it is still good quality. Before you see this movie, I do strongly recommend that you read both his books, World War Z and The Zombie Survival Guide: Complete Protection from the Living Dead. Without these books this movie would still be entertaining but you will not understand all of the subtle references that were placed periodically in the movie. Of course, no movie will replicate the book perfectly, in fact this movie does a pretty bad job, but this movie does pay a lot of respect to Max Brooks and his great books.

           At the end of the day, I recommend this movie and especially the two books that it is based on. All you need to do to have a good time is accept that there will be some plot holes and try to have a good time based on the action and thrilling scenes. Turn off your brain, sit back, and enjoy the ride!