Zombieland was an attempt to make a laughable and comedic
representation of a zombie apocalypse. The four main characters (really the
only characters in the movie besides Bill Murray as himself) are Columbus
(Jesse Eisenberg), Tallahassee (Woody Harrelson), Wichita (Emma Stone) and
Little Rock (Abigail Breslin). As the story goes on, the viewer may seem to
find a connection to the four characters because they are the only four human
beings who really are a focal point of the movie. The main goal of the four humans
was to make it to “Pacific Playland” outside of Los Angeles so that the 12
year-old Little Rock could have a little piece of her childhood because it was
close to impossible to have an enjoyable childhood in a nation covered with
zombies.
The beginning of the movie was a perfect satire of a zombie
apocalypse while showing some gruesome scenes of zombies eating flesh and
chasing human survivors all while making a game out of surviving the hoard of
zombies that were trying to kill and eat everyone. It used every day situations
such as a marriage and a little girls birthday party where the bride and the
little girls dressed up as princesses were mutated into zombies and were
attacking those around them who were still human. I believe that they did a great
job of setting the tone for the movie.
Columbus is the “main” character so to speak because the
movie starts of with his character and he plays the role of the narrator for
the remainder of the movie. He is a very awkward anti-social guy who likes to lock
himself in his room and play World of Warcraft and drink Code Red Mountain Dew
for the majority of his days. He is in Texas where he was going to college and
starts his journey by trying to make his way to Columbus, Ohio where his
parents live. Columbus, by narration, tells us that the zombie apocalypse
started when a person ate a “contaminated burger” and a Gas-N-Gulp, which is a
very silly reason compared to other zombie movies such as a terrible disease accidentally created by scientists or some sort of sickness transferred from
infected animals.
Columbus runs into the second character that we meet who
goes by the name of Tallahassee. If you couldn’t tell before, they all go by
the names of where they are from or where they are headed, so that they do not
become too close in case someone were to die or be turned into a zombie.
Tallahassee is the “bad-ass” character in the movie who was “in the business of
kicking ass even before zombies.” He tells us that the only thing he really
loved was his “puppy” named Buck who he lost to the zombies, but we later come
to find out that Buck was his little boy who was taken by the zombies. Tallahassee only has one weakness, his love
for Twinkies, which is displayed throughout the movie.
Columbus and Tallahassee run into Little Rock and Wichita at
an abandoned grocery store when the girls trick them into giving them all of
their guns and their car. After being scammed and robbed, they have a better
stroke of luck and find a Hummer full of automatic guns as well as shotguns and
pistols in the backseat, but are later tricked by Little Rock and Wichita again
except this time they all decide to stick together. Wichita (played by Emma
Stone) is the older sister of Little Rock who can only be described as the
confident and sexy girl who will do whatever it takes to survive and keep her
sister alive. She was the popular girl, much unlike Columbus, so it was easy to
see that they would fall in love eventually.
On their journey they end up at Bill Murray's house in
Hollywood where Columbus shoots Bill Murray after mistaking him for a zombie.
While at the house, you can begin to see how they all start to bond and become
more friendly and like a family. The next morning, not to Columbus and
Tallahassee’s surprise, the girls are off to find Pacific Playland. Once they
arrive, they turn on all the lights and rides, which generates a lot of visual
and audible stimuli to the zombies who immediately are attracted to the
amusement park. Little Rock and Wichita find themselves in trouble when the
hoard of zombies is too much for them to take. Tallahassee and Columbus come to
the rescue and save the girls from the zombies. Columbus gets the girl and
Tallahassee gets his beloved Twinkie and it is a happily ever after ending.
Now that I have given the layout of the story, I want to
talk about some things that make the movie what it is. The story was written
very well to make something that most people would consider very scary and
gross into a laughable and funny situation while keeping the same sense of
danger of being killed and eaten. The small cast was a good idea because the
story is too short to have more than 4 or 5 main characters because it would
not give the audience enough time to bond with those characters and make them
feel more real. Columbus’ rules were a fantastic addition to the story because
they were very true. Rules such as “Cardio” and “Double Tap” were essential to
surviving in the “United States of Zombieland” as he calls it.
The four characters and their differences make the group of
people very relate-able because there is every type of person. Tallahassee is a
southerner and a father from Texas, Columbus was a nerd and anti-social boy
from Ohio, Wichita was the popular and beautiful girl, and Little Rock was the
young girl who was innocent, but at the same time portrayed qualities of a
tom-boy so to speak. I believed that the whole idea of “Pacific Playland” was a
good sign of hope because it gave them something to look forward to and
something to survive for. The writers did a brilliant job of making Tallahassee
rock-hard on the outside, but still have the soft side of a father as well as
his weakness for Twinkies. The movie brings up a lot of good points about
living in a world filled with zombies such as “enjoying the little things” and
letting off steam by breaking things, so that you wouldn’t go mad in a crazy
world.
I have a little bit of a bias because Jesse Eisenberg is not
one of my favorite actors because of his awkward boy role that he plays in
every single one of his movies, so it was hard to see him just as Columbus and
not as Mark Zuckerberg from The Social
Network or the pizza delivery guy in 30
Minutes or Less. Despite his style of acting, he did a good job in this
movie portraying the nerdy, anti-social type. As for the camerawork, I believe
everything was on par. There was not anything that stuck out to me in the
special effects or editing of the movie, so that was very nice. Everything was
smooth and flowed nicely with the story. The casting in the movie was
fantastic. I believe that Emma Stone is a great actress who, unlike Eisenberg,
can play many different roles and characters in movies without the overflow of
characters from different movies. She is beautiful and played the part very
nicely. Tallahassee, played by Woody Harrelson, was my favorite character and
did a perfect job of matching the personality that was needed for his
character. Little Rock was played by the young actress Abigail Breslin, who was
a good casting job for her part because of the tom-boy yet innocent character
that was needed.
Overall I would give this movie a 9 out of 10, only because
the story at some points of the movie feels a little empty, but that seen very
little in this horror/comedy film. It did a great job compared to Shaun of the
Dead, which is the classic horror/comedy movie. It shied away from Shaun of the
Dead and had a completely new story of its own, which was a relief. This movie
is great for zombie, violence and comedy lovers looking for some laugh out loud
moments as well as those gruesome scenes of zombies tearing up the dead and
eating them. I would definitely recommend this movie.
Grant Ausbury
