Interesting and unusual zombie film, a fair bit better than it sounds.

Rating: 6/10 (1 May 2013)

I know what you're thinking. 'Oh dear Lord, no not another teenage-girl-falls-in-love-with-a-monster romance', right? After five mediocre and depressingly humourless. A quick glance at the plot synopsis certainly suggests that Twilight-with-zombies is the best that one could hope for here. However, appearances can be deceptive and Warm Bodies (adapted from a hit novel by Isaac Marion) is a pretty enjoyable and original twist on the concept, bristling with wit and a lot more fun to watch than the afore-mentioned adaptations of Stephenie Meyer's books. It's not perfect by a long shot, but is nevertheless worth a look.
Following a worldwide apocalypse, most of the population has transformed into zombies. In an un-named American city, a handful of human survivors exist within a walled compound. They are surrounded by suburbs full of staggering zombies, hungry for a hearty meal of human brains (weirder still, after devouring brains the zombies are able to experience some of their victims' memories and thoughts). One zombie, known simply as R (Nicholas Hoult), is different from the others. Although slow-moving and barely able to speak, somewhere in his mind there remains a flicker of curiosity, a wider contemplation about what has happened to him, and a dim desire to uncover his past. He lives on an abandoned plane out on a deserted runway, where he collects old bric-a-brac that he has scavenged from the ruined city. During a run-in with human hunters, R spots a human girl named Julie (Teresa Palmer) and something within him is inexplicably stirred. He rescues her from being eaten by the others and smuggles her back to his plane, where he promises to protect her for a few days after which he will return her home. Against all odds, R's time with Julie reignites his long-inactive heart, and he begins to gradually metamorphosise into something more 'human'. Julie herself becomes attached to R, and their blossoming relationship stirs human emotions within the other zombies too, suggesting that it may be possible to cure them rather than blowing their brains out. The problem is that Julie's father Grigio (John Malkovich) has dedicated his life to wiping out zombies, building an army of soldiers who go out on regular sorties to kill as many of the walking dead as possible. Will Julie and R be able to convince him that there is another way, or has his frenzied bloodlust driven him past the point of no return?
It soon becomes apparent that Warm Bodies owes more to Romeo and Juliet than Twilight. It's no accident that the main characters are called R and Julie, nor that they find love when their people are meant to be sworn enemies. Just in case you're not getting the parallels, there's even at one point an amusingly played twist on the famous Romeo and Juliet balcony scene. The film gets a lot of mileage from its wry humour and continual insistence of flipping conventions on their head. Hoult gives a warm performance as a character who should be anything but warm; Aussie actress Palmer shows a decent emotional range as the heroine of the piece too, delivering a winning performance which will no doubt result in us seeing plenty more of her over the coming years. Malkovich is his usual dependable self as the grief-stricken zombie killer whose humanity may be too far gone to save. It's a small role but exceptionally well-played, but then you wouldn't expect anything less. There are weaknesses along the way, such as occasional logic loopholes and disappointingly clunky CGI villains in the shape of the 'bonies' (skeletal zombies who have peeled off their flesh and are beyond redemption). With its relatively brief running time, one also wishes from time to time that Warm Bodies would milk its own possibilities a little more – there certainly seems to be scope for an even more in-depth and satisfying look at this fascinating divided apocalyptic society. The film scratches the surface but leaves one lamenting that there isn't more. Overall, however, Warm Bodies is better than expected. The zombie genre is already far too heavily populated, but this film manages to find some new and interesting angles to justify its existence (it's certainly one of the first films – maybe THE first – to be told from the zombie perspective). Give it a look – you could do a lot worse.