Zombieland
Zombie horror is extremely popular now, its leading pictures including Shaun of the Dead, Dawn of the Dead and Night of the Living Dead. I'm glad (and almost astonished) to say that Zombieland has joined their majesty. Surprisingly, it was difficult to pass accurate and truthful judgement over it but on the whole, it was an impressive film with actually funny comedic scenes and a different take entirely on zombie films that we've seen so far.
Zombieland - starring Jesse Eisenberg, Woody Harrelson, Emma Stone and Abigail Breslin - tells us the story from Columbus' (Eisenberg) anxious point of view, with his list of rules and 'irritable bowel syndrome', automatically setting this character apart from any other. Columbus travels across the States with Tallahassee (Harrelson), badass hillbilly who loves his car and is on a never-ending search for the last Twinkie; while being a total kickass, we do discover a surprising past about Tallahassee that could change your mind about him - no spoilers! We meet the con-sisters Wichita (Stone) and Little Rock (Breslin) who are also pretty badass, but seemed to let the side down; Wichita managed to irritate me in almost every scene, though her sister was better.
What sets Zombieland apart from all other films in that genre is the character development and focus on them. Seldom do you see more than one characters' pasts in these sorts of movies and Rhet Reese and Paul Wernick wrote them beautifully. Whilst Columbus and Tallahassee have plenty of screen time and we uncover their past throughout the film, Wichita and Little Rock are rather underwritten, only giving us a small peek into their life pre-apocalypse. One of the nicest things about the character development and vastly different characters is that you get to watch them get comfortable with each other and become something akin to a zombie-exterminating family taking a road trip to an amusement park. The entire notion of the plot is completely ridiculous but still manages to make it a funny and somewhat endearing film.
So even though it deserves to be in the same top five list of zombie films for me, it didn't blow me away like Shaun of the Dead, but then again, nothing has managed to blow me like Shaun of the Dead, since there's really no competition. Zombieland was an enjoyable experience and had me laughing a lot throughout the film - good quality characters and a nice change to the serious zombie films focused on torturing the survivors.
Camera angles: Some of the camera angles would be achievable even by a no-budget film. For example, in the beginning, the camera shot is of the American flag seemingly standing proud but then it turns and reveals the flag on a car is sideways and the car is upside down. The camera angle would be easy, as it is merely turning it on its side, however, the car on its side would most certainly be difficult to do.
Budget: In order to attain the effect they desired (for the characters to be entirely alone), the creators would have had to close streets, whole halves of cities and close down a theme park simply for the set. This in itself would cost thousands of dollars. The price was increased by the need of props, special effect, vehicles and so on.
