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| image by Maciej Pwalik via sxc.hu |
From the previews Warm Bodies seemed like another mediocre paranormal romance in the vane of Twilight, and as such I had no desire to see it.Well when I finally did, while not awful it was by no means a good movie, and I have no desire to ever watch it again.
The parallels to twilight are there no matter how much the fan boys want to deny it. Girl bored with her life falls a guy who turns out to be a monster? Check. Is loosely based on/inspired by Romeo & Juliet? Check. The good monsters help fight the bad ones? Double check. Clichéd love conquers all message and saccharine ending? Big time.
To be fair long before Twilight was around you had the Beauty and the Beast TV series from the 80s, along with Forever Night and the Highlander series. Then Joss Whedon pulled the same crap with Buffy and Angel, then again with her and Spike. Didn’t like it then and still don’t now.
That being said the main reason I disliked Warm Bodies is because it was so predictable and boring. The previews gave away the movie and all the plot points were so obvious you’d have to be brain dead or stoned to not see them coming.
Moreover the first half hour was so depressive and boring owing both to the dreary cinematography and the fact we are forced to hear R’s monotone voice overs that are as dead as him. I love self deprecating humor, the problem is that Nick Holt didn’t have either the comedic timing or tone that makes it funny. Honestly I thought about turning the movie off about 20 minutes because he came off as such a whiny little bitch. Definitely a case where less is more was warranted.
Second the love theme was handled in the same hackneyed ways we’ve scene a thousand times. Seriously he sees Julie and falls for her instantly? Yawn. Julie has no issue that R ate her boyfriend and only pauses once to ponder whether it’s weird she has the hots for a zombie. Let’s not even mention how R kidnaps and hold her hostage under the pretense of keeping her safe, all so he can perv on her, because that’s not fucked up at all,right?
Plot holes the size of trucks litter the movie. Instead of escaping when she has the chance while changing seats with R during the Joy ride scene, Julie waits until the dead of night and then gets caught. She is then saved by M, who only a few days ago tried to eat her, but by the power of deus ex machina is a good zombie now. And when Julie’s father and his men come upon the house they’re in she again chooses to spend time with the creepy stalker R rather than, you know, going home where it’s safe.
I won’t bore you with the other plot holes because at this point they’re pair for the course of any movie, however what I will say about Warm bodies, is that if it wanted to be a social commentary about modern times then it failed.
The notions that all the worlds problems can be fixed by love is the same fairy tale bullshit that’s been fed to us since we were in diapers. It didn’t address the number one issues of the day: the wealth gap, lack of good paying jobs, and distrust of government institutions.
Julie lives in a compound that has running water electricity and a working TV/com system from which the leadership gives edicts about safety and keeping up moral. Sure she mentions how she hasn’t had a beer in a while and that the internet doesn’t exist, but she still has access to an ipod.
How much would it have killed the writers/directors to add a group of survivors who lived outside the compound? Not only would have added to the story but would have made the conflict between the human and zombies more layered , so that at the end these outsiders would have been less likely to accept R and the others help fighting the bonies or living among them.
All in all I see warm Bodies as a wasted opportunity. To see a staple of the horror genre through a new lens was interesting at first, but ultimately failed because R was a wimpy zombie. I’ll be glad when monster movies go back to scaring people, instead being masturbatory fantasies for emotionally immature teenage and adult women.