A Romantic, Comedy, Drama, Horror Movie

Rating: 9/10 (17 January 2019)

3 February 2013. This rare blend of comedy and drama with a romance, horror genre is a difficult editing and scriptwriting challenge. To maintain the tone and balance is a juggling act where too much horror can easily destroy the comedy or too much comedy will make too light of the drama, or the romance can be easily lost as just a fluffy add on. In Warm Bodies, this uneasy mixture seems to have developed into a full flavored banquet that is emotive, meaningful, thrilling, and tender. As with The Devil Wears Prada (2006) and Electric Dreams (1984) the melodic music is well adapted to this movie and in a few places actually carries the movie itself. This is a predictable romantic comedy with strong dramatic elements with the zombie horror action thrills presented with a great comedic voice-over. Unlike Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet or West Side Story (1961), this movie comes at a time in American history where the Great Recession appears to be over and besides global warming and international alarm, our Country is more hopeful in its outlook while facing an emerging Hispanic population and the movie's tone appears to embrace similar challenges that we face today. Unlike Escape from New York (1981) where the President's plane crashes behind the towering walls surrounding Manhattan that has been turned into a national prison, the walls that have been built up in America will need to torn down, a message that seems to underlie the larger framework of Warm Bodies, along with the magical power of love.
Warm Bodies appears to build on the comedy-drama of All About Steve (2009) with flashes of the comedy flare of Ghost Town (2008). At the same time, this movie also incorporates the more biting drama-comedy as found in Terry Gilliam's The Fisher King (1991). The same way that The Demolition Man (1993) brought together elements of comedy into science fiction action genre or Tropic Thunder (2008) set in a comedy set in a deadly serious Asian war arena where the characters believe its all a movie set, is where each of these genre necessarily brushed up with sharp rough edges, Warm Bodies was necessarily cut where horror scenes would sour the lighter comedy elements, where the transitional scenes between comedy and drama and action threatened to become boringly slow was filled with impending, hauntingly beautiful music to carry the mood through to the next scene.
Warm Bodies even takes is underlying romantic theme from Roman Holiday (1953) where a sheltered princess is exposed to the love experience with an American newsman in Rome. Romantic flashes of Total Recall (1990), Dances with Wolves (1990), even the classic sci fi The Day The Earth Stood Still (1951) or Blade Runner (1982) reverberate throughout this movie.
It's difficult to assess whether the awkward newness of this fusion of genres, the unsettling mixture, the at times slow pacing, it's seeming predictability are a product of a weakness of this movie or whether its boldly forging ahead with these momentous changes in movie plot developing incorporating major distinctively different genres are reflection more of a brilliance is hard to say.