World War P.C.

Rating: 6/10 (29 April 2014)

The basic plot of this sci-fier is pretty good. A rabies-like pathogen is rapidly spreading and zombifying folks over the greater girth of the globe. For viewers who dote on CGI, there are scenes where scads of the afflicted swarm at lightning speed. For those in the audience who prefer killer suspense, there is a slow, scary struggle through the halls of a zombie-infested laboratory. One scene--the flick's creepiest--has Brad Pitt and one of the litchy-looking creatures separated by a mere glass partition. As the two silently size each other up, the monster grotesquely glares and gnashes his teeth. Despite all the snapping and snarling, however, the film has a dearth of blood and gore--which probably disappoints many fans of the zombie genre. The movie seems much more concerned with political messages and, sadly, not the sort traditionally seen in science fiction. There is no hint that the dread disease is related to the recklessness or poor choices of mankind, no clue that science has somehow gone mad and birthed a world- destroying monstrosity. The message of this movie is non-subtle and non-stop, and it's the same one that infects almost all modern, English- language cinema. And this offering is so full of it that a viewer might find himself counting incidents of political correctness rather than attacks by the creatures. The film's creators couldn't change the fact that ticket-selling Brad Pitt is a white male, so they made him a pancake-cooking Mr. Mom in an otherwise female household. His neighbors are a Hispanic couple who don't speak English, his old boss an African, his new helpmate a macho Israeli woman. When the latter's countrymen erect a wall to forestall the zombies, they just climb over it. (Of course, like the Mexican border, it's unguarded!) And, naturally, Pitt's humanity-saving mission doesn't land at world-class Ben Gurion Airport, but at Arafat Airport--which is, in reality, a bombed-out, non- functioning ruin. Fortunately, this film has just enough action and suspense to avoid the same fate.