Zombieland: Double Tap

The talented Ruben Fleischer serves up the Comedy of the Year, the Ride of the Year and the Zombie Movie of the Year! I have to admit I didn't have much faith in the film after the trailers, but from the opening minutes it was set to be a heartwarming affair and it was! It's been 10 years since the first Zombieland and the world and characters have changed, especially the zombies, who have evolved and now split into different species, which I found terribly fresh and novel. Of the cast, Woody Harrelson obviously rocks the most, stealing most of the scenes for himself, but the nerdy Jesse Eisenberg and Emma Stone are also awesome. The only bland one is Abigail Breslin, who both looks awful and is more of a by-the-numbers character, so the new characters are a much welcome. The sexy Rosario Dawson and the adorable Zoey Deutch, who plays the naive silly Barbie to perfection and made the whole cinema laugh out loud during every scene with her. (“You know why she's still alive? Because zombies eat brains and she ain't got none.”) Apart from the perfect humour, the action is also a good, nicely shot, brutal, original and entertaining, including the climactic finale. The highlights definitely include the annual awards for Zombie kill of the year. One of those films where you say "I want to see that again!" when it's over. A big surprise this year and it will be fighting for the top spot. P.S. The post-credits cameo scene is perfect. 90%. (10/20/2019)

With this bunch (including the pink blonde), you wouldn’t be bored even if they just stood around talking at a bus stop. Even so, the screenwriters of the second Zombieland didn’t exactly overwork themselves. The film is a road movie with three stops where something happens just for a moment of amusement, not for moving some elaborate story forward, much less for enriching genre conventions. Even the imaginative pacifist smelting of weapons in Babylon was spoiled by the silly solution of the final problem with the zombie army. It’s okay for watching once, though. (11/26/2019)

Whereas some lenient reviews assert that the second Zombieland offers essentially the same thing as the first one, that is not entirely true. While watching the film, you repeatedly say to yourself that specific scenes and shots are a variation of something from the first film, whether that is slow-motion splatter shots or the characters pushing each other around. But that is merely just mechanical fan service and thus basically the exact opposite of the very essence of the first Zombieland, which became a sensation in its time because it came up with a fresh approach to zombie flicks and managed to transform them into clever entertainment by means of a detached view and genre reflection. The second film, on the other hand, is shocking in its failure to offer anything fresh or original. It is as if the returning filmmakers had suffered a severe case of dementia over the preceding decade and are thus merely repeating what they did last time. Furthermore, whereas the first film had a certain degree of causality and, above all, it managed to build a functional and coherent world, here everything falls to pieces. The result is an unwanted travesty in which the characters find themselves outside of their world, while the new reality lacks any cohesion (which is most apparent in the absolutely dysfunctional and interchangeable environment of the climax). Everything could almost be saved by claiming that this time the filmmakers came up with a brilliant meta concept which, following the example of typically insipid direct-to-video sequels, offers a deliberately cheaper and more shoddily made variation of the original hit, but nothing in the film indicates such a degree of detachmentand conceptuality. (11/09/2019)

In terms of content, this a clearly bad film. Its schematic, weak and sloppy story about the journey of the characters from point A to point B serves only as a necessary link for a series of comedy sketches and action scenes with zombies, all with fluctuating levels of quality. The film of course copies the first Zombieland, but this time it's all much simpler, more straightforward, more predictable and, overall, somewhat worse in all respects. Moreover, after ten years, the main characters have degraded to annoying one-dimensional caricatures. The film is fully aware that they are unbearable, but rather than doing anything about it, it uses these aspects as a source of humour (and builds a panopticon around them of deliberately annoying and exaggerated, demented side characters consisting of personalized stereotypes, so that the main characters appear more sympathetic to the audience). The film is partly saved by a fairly entertaining level of comedy, and in places by the actors, who obviously enjoyed filming it, which the audience can see. Only every third to fourth joke works, but with the huge cadence of gags, it doesn't matter much. (10/23/2019)

To my own surprise, the sequel after six years was even more fun than the first installment. The plot seemed more coherent, I also liked the calmer part in the White House and I was pleased that the authors cast Zoey Deutch and Rosario Dawson. Oddly enough, I didn't even mind that it was a blatant rip-off of the 2013 film, some scenes almost a carbon copy of the original idea. (03/05/2020)