Episode 99: Exit Humanity and Day Zero

The Undead Symphony

This week two very different movies.
2 years before Brad Pitt brought his perfect chin line and blond bob to the mainstream zombieverse in World War Z someone made Exit Humanity, which does seem to have been based on Max Brooks' book, just that it is set in 1865 after the US Civil War. We do have a pretty decent cast in Brian Cox narrating the book (as the central character keeps a journal about the plague and it's origins and how to beat the dead) which is 100% stolen from the WWZ book, Stephen McHattie and Chops Moseley as the villains.
We follow Edward Young as he survives the zombie apocalypse of slow moving, pale faced silent shufflers, meeting up with Dee Wallace's witch Eve, and fellow confederate soldier Isaac and sister Emma. A fine replacement for Young's dead wife and son if ever there was one.
Not as bad as I thought, but with the near constant music, ultra high def filming which I hated, and it is clearly is a WWZ rip off.
5.5/10
And I have been waiting for Day Zero, with Filipino kickboxing champion Brandon Vera racing around fast moving infected slums looking for his family, since I saw the add in the Summer.
Well it is is here now, and I liked it. Not hugely, it isn't a game changer, but it was fun, fast paced, constantly tense as Vera does some damage with fists, guns and knives and, well, anything he can get his hands on.
Claustrophobic, tense, with Korean like zombies of the cloudy eyed, blue veined, screaming running variety, if it was in a bigger tenement building and more like Dredd or The Raid, it would have been even better. Definitely worth a watch. It is nonstop.
6/10