Zombies are seemingly everywhere. In addition to anchoring one of the country’s most popular television series in The Walking Dead, in just the last 14 months they’ve done big-screen battle with British East-Enders in Cockneys vs. Zombies, served as the backdrop for a funky tale of blossoming young love in Warm Bodies, been given the John Hughes treatment in Detention of the Dead, worked their way into a hijacked indie film production in Zombie Hamlet, and chased Brad Pitt to the highest theatrical receipts of his career in the form of World War Z.
It’s only fitting, then, that they also inspire a tale of obsessive twentysomething romance taken too far. After all, what are zombies if not the perfect metaphor for that lurking, ever-present ex-significant other who will just… not… leave… you… alone? Burying the Ex, scripted by Alan Trezza and directed by Joe Dante, is that tale. The movie centers on Max (Anton Yelchin), whose ex-girlfriend Evelyn (Ashley Greene) dies and then becomes reanimated. Along with the attendant desire for human flesh, though, she also wants to get back together — idealizing their relationship and taking her zombified state as little more than a sign that their love is meant to be, as Outkast would say, forever-ever. Understandably, this complicates things for Max, with both his new girlfriend Olivia (Alexandra Daddario) and just his life in general.
On a balmy day this past December that represented part of the home stretch of this independent production’s 20-odd day principal photography schedule, I had a chance to visit the set of Burying the Ex, tucked away in a small studio just off a Los Angeles freeway, to observe filming and chat with cast and crew. For some thoughts on the experience, trip on over to ShockYa, by all means.
Daily Archives: January 23, 2014
Slamdance: Vanishing Pearls
A Slamdance Film Festival world premiere and documentary competition title that delves into a subset of the disastrous aftereffects of the April, 2010, British Petroleum Deepwater Horizon oil spill, Vanishing Pearls: The Oystermen of Pointe à la Hache is a devastating piece of community portraiture, and a look at the diminished choices of the working poor. Directed by Nailah Jefferson, this modestly scaled but no less heartrending work is instructive about the different public faces that corporations will try on, depending on how many cameras are on them and what best suits their most pressing purposes. There is no one easy answer or solution that emerges from Vanishing Pearls — no single decision that, if reversed, would bring stability to its subjects. And maybe that’s what’s saddest of all — that the exploitation of the poor takes many shapes, but that they are also among the most economically susceptible to forces of change beyond their control. For the full, original review, from ShockYa, click here; for more information on the movie, click here to visit its website. (Perspective Pictures, unrated, 88 minutes)