Infectiously good, even if perhaps not a true zombie film

Rating: 8/10 (23 June 2013)

Although it deviates from the source material more than a tad, World War Z is a certifiable, credible thriller that's part old-time adventure film and part new-school medical procedural. It's a fast-moving, intricate, and solidly acted by the indomitable Brad Pitt.
Okay, sure, the "Z" stands for zombies (in the book and in the film), but let's be frank (or Bob or Justine) - these aren't zombies, really. Well, they're sort of a cross between a zombie and the victims of the Rage virus from 28 Days Later. The bitten turn into homicidal maniacs about ten seconds after infection has set in. But they're attracted to noise and to life itself, so essentially if you both have a terminal disease and are really quiet, they won't see you. These infected are sort of like the T. Rex of the human populace.
Brad Pitt plays Gerry Lane, a former UN employee with some knowledge about infectious disease. He's driving his kids to school and his wife (Mirielle Enos) to work in Philadelphia when it happens - sudden stop of traffic followed by cars crashing, police scrambling, and finally, a horde of contaminated peoples running amok over the city, coming after those who still live. This sets off the expected chain of events of Gerry and his family ushered out of Newark, NJ to a ship in the North Atlantic, from where the UN is running its operation of Find the Cause. The UN, in the person of Thierry Umutoni (Fana Mokoena), pulls Gerry into the scrum: they feel he's their man; he's the one who can find out not only where the infection began but how to stop it.
Gerry's adventures take him to such incongruous places as South Korea, Israel, and Wales at a frenetic pace. Some scenes are eerily reminiscent of John Carpenter's The Thing; in one, Gerry and a military escort must silently pedal bikes to a plane for refueling, so as not to alert the walking dead and thus turn them into running dead. It's a creepy, chilling scene, and never has riding a bike looked so difficult.
Now, if you've read the book by Max Brooks and plan to see this movie, you should know that the overall structure of Brooks' book (narration by Lane) is jettisoned for a more straightforward action-movie approach. And you might well be put off by that at first, but once you get over your faux outrage, you may discover that the movie is actually the better for the change; the result is much more suspenseful and riveting on the big screen than a true adaptation might have been.
I like Brad Pitt, and this makes up for Killing Them Softly in spades. He's his usual terrific self as Gerry, who isn't some hardscrabble, world-weary action guy but rather an authentic everyman who could be any of us, only with better hair. His Lane is shown to be quite vulnerable (physically and psychologically), and Pitt's able to pull it off magnificently - unlike, say, a Tom Cruise or a Leonardo DiCaprio (the latter made a heavy bid for the rights to Brooks' tome). This is part of what makes Pitt such a fine actor. He's malleable; he can play bad guy, good guy, action hero, clever bastard, and so on without looking out of his element. He is the driving force of this film.
As I mentioned, the movie moves (shambles?) at a quick pace. Ordinarily, this might mean that there's little plot involved, but if anything the movie is overplotted. Thankfully, time isn't wasted trying to explain to us every little detail about how Lane arrives at certain conclusions or on secondary or tertiary characters and their reasons for being where they are. It's a succinct plot that makes the best use of its runtime.
World War Z, although perhaps not a true zombie film (are the victims killed and then turn or are are they infected and then turn?), is a perfectly good adrenaline-rush movie with a punchy, intelligent script and a typical knockout performance by Pitt.