Cute Take on the Genre

Rating: Null/10 (4 February 2013)

Warm Bodies (2013)
*** (out of 4)
Cute and different take on the living dead genre has zombie R (Nicholas Hoult) going against the rules and not eating Julie (Teresa Palmer) but instead he falls in love with her, which sets a whole new thing into motion. WARM BODIES isn't a flawless films but for the most part it's very charming and has enough clever moments to make it worth watching. I will start off with the flaws and I'd say that it takes the film quite a bit before it starts to (no pun intended) warm up. The first ten-minutes of the film are pretty boring but this might be because we're basically watching the so-old zombie stuff, the same old apocalypse stuff and it's not until the two leads meet does the film finally start to pick up. I think once the love story kicks in is when the film finally gets going and a lot of the credit has to go to Hoult and Palmer for their strong work. I thought Hoult was extremely believable in his part as the zombie and this includes when he's just a dead creature searching for humans but he's also very believable the more human he becomes. Palmer easily steals the film with her warm and rather bubbly character. The actress certainly nailed the part and I look forward to seeing her in other films. John Malkovich plays her father, a man also leading the battle against the zombies. I wouldn't say he's great but it's still fun seeing someone like him in a movie like this. The screenplay also offers up a few funny gags including the girl holding up a Blu-ray case Lucio Fulci's notorious ZOMBIE to compare what that zombie looked like compared to R. Another great thing going for the film is that we're given quite a terrific soundtrack with the works of Bob Dylan, Bruce Springsteen, Guns 'n Roses, Roy Orbinson, John Waite and others. Fans of vinyl will also enjoy how the format is worked into the story. Again, WARM BODIES features all sorts of flaws but for the most part it's entertaining enough to make it worth viewing.