Warm Bodies takes an interesting spin on the typical zombie movie. Instead of being heart-stoppingly terrifying, it’s actually a nice blend of cute and witty with a bit of suspense thrown in. The story follows R, an atypical zombie, who falls in love with a human survivor and starts to become more human himself (because of their love, how romantic!). It’s a simple and quirky romantic zombie comedy, which is a kind of odd genre for a film, but one that is surprisingly successful.
With a funny and endearing cast the plot moves along quite quickly. Nicholas Hoult was wonderful as R and quite impressing since most of his character development happened in his (humorous) internal narrative or his slow grunting, groaning, and shuffling. Other standouts were Teresa Palmer, who played Julie, R’s romantic interest, (get it, R and Julie?) and Rob Corddry as M, R’s zombie friend. Both actors added to the charming sweetness and humor of the movie with their solid performances.
Not to get too philosophical on everyone, but Warm Bodies actually has some very interesting social criticism. The film makes some very interesting parallels to the way that we have lost true connection with our fellow humans and become like zombies, because of the hyper connectivity we have with technology and media. The film is not overly preachy on this point, and it’s sweet more than anything, but it still makes you think a bit.
Now (just one nitpick), as a person who has actually prepared for the zombie apocalypse, I found the post-zombie-apocalyptic world of the film to be a bit too idyllic and comfortable, but I guess it’s appropriate to the fairy tale nature of the story. The film is meant to be a charming and humorous Zombie-Human romance story and it succeed without being overly cloying or contrived. Also, it was an appropriate length, which was one of my favorite things about it. Everything was short sweet and to the point—as it should be. It’s not going to win any awards, but it really is a fun, hilarious, relaxed movie to see.
Runtime: 98 min
Rated PG-13 for zombie violence and some language