Army Of The Dead

 

Released: 2021

Directed by: Zack Snyder

Starring: Dave Batista, Matthias Schweigefor, Ana De La Reguera, Hiroyuki Sanada

Rating: 3.5 out of 5

Las Vegas has fallen to a zombie horde. Enclosed behind high walls, the City of Second Chances is now a zombified warzone, while the world without suffers an influx of refugees and instability. Amid this chaos, an opportunity arises for former army op Scott Ward (Dave Batista) - retrieve $200 million from a casino with a team of his choice, and $50 million will be theirs to keep. But the job is more than it appears, and as they make their way through the city more and more comes to light.

(L-R): Dave Batista, Omari Hardwick, Tig Notaro, Samantha Win, Garrett Dillahunt, Matthias Schweighofer, Raul Castillo, and Ana de la Reguera

    Army of The Dead is a zombie movie and a heist movie. These aren't just regular zombie survivors - they're the gutsy badasses that get recruited for heists! The stellar ensemble alone makes the film worth seeing - the snarky pilot, the quirky safecracker, the muscular wheelmen, all whacked up with a standard helping of machine gun and zombie-killer? This is the sort of thing films are made for. A particularly memorable inclusion is the Mikey Guzman character (Raul Castillo), a YouTube influencer who's turned zombie killing into a hashtag trend. 

    But the central plot is entrancing too; the film's hero Scott Ward (Dave Batista) is an entrancing character; a soldier who killed his zombified wife and has a cooler-than-average relationship with his college-age daughter because of it. While he's mainly known for his comedic role as Drax in Guardians of the Galaxy, Batista shows compelling range, exhibiting toughness and sensitivity. When his daughter insists on accompanying the team to rescue a mother she's been helping, it all becomes very personal. 

Lily (Nora Arnazeder) and Scott (Dave Batista) light it up.

    And the zombie tropes are fresh too; plenty of heads are blown up and plenty of ghastly kills happen. Since the leads are mostly military, we get a higher-than-average ratio of headshots. From zombie king to zombie horse to zombie tiger, the undead have never looked better. And their usual reflection of society is there too; Vegas is now a parody of the get-rich-quick instinct. Zombie Elvises shuffle the streets while looters break open ATM's. Displaced people have become refugees, and cruel guards show humanity at its worst. All this window dressing culminates in a truly spectacular finale, as the threat of a nuke coming to end the zombies looms large. 

    That said, it's not perfect. Army of The Dead is better than most zombie films, but not better than most heist films. Like the worst horror movies, it hinges things on characters making dumb decisions. Moments that feel like they set up something later have little pay-off. And a few frustrating choices balloon into stupidity in the later half. It's overall stunning, but the audience is likely to leave the theater (or living room, as it's streaming on Netflix too) with a frustrating lack of satisfaction. This is enough cumulatively to bring the film down from truly excellent to merely pretty good. 3.5 out of 5. 

Army of the Dead is in theaters and available to stream on Netflix.