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(The Girls Guitar Club, Zombieland, TV: Jimmy Kimmel Live!, The Right Now! Show)
Producer:
Gavin Polone
Screenplay:
Rhett Reese and Paul Wernick
Music:
David Sardy
Cast :
Tallahassee: Woody Harrelson
Columbus: Jesse Eisenberg
Wichita: Emma Stone
Little Rock: Abigail Breslin
406: Amber Heard
Himself: Bill Murray
I heard a lot of great things prior to watching Zombieland,
especially with the comparison to the exceptional
Shaun of the Dead
on the box cover.
The premise is that zombies have taken over the world. We don't know why. We don't need to know why, but they're here
and we join loner Columbus (Jesse Eisenberg) narrating the situation, beginning with his rules for survival,
such as ensuring your cardio fitness is good so you can outrun them and also the necessary 'double tap' - you think
they're dead from a single shot, but that's rarely the case, so a second shot, in the head, solves all that.
He's travelling from his school campus in Texas to his parents in Ohio - hoping they're still alive - and meets up
with Tallahassee (Woody Harrelson), at which point we learn they're using their birthplaces as names rather than
real names, as the latter doesn't want to get too familiar as everyone has a tendancy to die, sooner or later. Along
the way they hook up with hottie Wichita (Emma Stone) and her younger sister Little Rock (Abigail Breslin),
with a view, for the girls at least, to ending up at the Pacific Playland theme park, reportedly the only place that's
zombie-free.
Zombieland is essentially a road movie which also features the foursome going over to Bill Murray's
house to live the high life, who also pops up in a cameo. However, while it's very clever in a lot of places early on,
and a bit slow in some others, to my surprise, after about 30 minutes in it just stops going anywhere. We know geeky
Columbus will fancy Wichita and that she's unlikely to fancy him, so what are the odds they'll get together? Even the
zombie-killing gets boring after a while and there's no sense of excitement as the film finally winds up at the theme park.
On the plus side, at least the roads are full of abandoned cars, unlike the recent Survivors series, but that
obviously doesn't save what is a massive missed opportunity.
The film is presented in its original 2.40:1 anamorphic widescreen ratio and is highly-detailed with no problems.
For the record, I'm watching on a Panasonic 37" Plasma screen via a Samsung BD-P1500 Blu-ray player.
The sound is in DTS-HD MA 5.1, although I only had access to it in DTS 5.1, and is fine for the occasional scenes with
gunshots as well as dialogue.
The extras are as follows:
In Search of Zombieland (15:57):
A featurette with comments from the key cast and crew mixed in with clips from the film and behind-the-scenes footage.
Zombieland is your land (11:59):
This featurette mostly looks at the locations chosen for the film.
Deleted Scenes (5:27):
These show the film was shot in Super 35 and gives a decent 16:9 print. There are 7 of them, although none demand to
be put back in.
Visual Effects Progression Scenes (2:08):
Adding CGI background effects to the blank canvas of scenes.
Theatrical promo trailers (6:04):
5 of them here with Columbus and Tallahassee answering "viewers' questions", as it were. Bizarre stuff.
Trailers:
for 2012, Year One, Boondock Saints II and this film, plus one to promote the format of Blu-ray.
Audio commentary:
from the two male leads, director and the writers.
Audio descriptive track:
Runs throughout the length of the film.
Picture-in-picture track:
Extra behind-the-scenes info while you watch the film.
BD Live:
Connect your Blu-ray player to the internet and it sounds like you'll be able to get info the IMDB page for this film.
I've never got my player to go online properly before, so I'll just visit IMDB anyway.
The menu is made to look like a duck-shoot at the funfair with the appropriate noises.
There are English subtitles plus Arabic, Danish, Dutch, Finnish, French, Hindi, Norwegian and Swedish.
However, the film could do with a few more chapters as there's only 16 throughout the 89-minute film.
As of April 2009, Blu-rays and DVDs reviewed by the editor are watched on a Panasonic TH-37PX80B
37" Plasma TV with a Sony BDP-1500 Blu-ray player and played through a Yamaha DSP-AX820 amplifier.
PC games reviewed by the editor are on:
Since Jan 2011: Intel Quad Core Dell XPS 8100, i7 CPU 860 @ 2.80Ghz, 8Gb RAM, nVidia GeForce GTS 240, Windows 7
Since Nov 2005: Intel Pentium D 830 3.0Ghz, 1Gb RAM, 128Mb nVidia GeForce 6700XL, Windows XP
Since Aug 2003: Intel Pentium 4 2.66Ghz, 512Mb RAM, 128Mb GeForce4 MX440 graphics, Windows XP
Since May 2003: Intel Pentium 4 2.6Ghz, 512Mb RAM, 128Mb ATI Radeon 9600TX graphics, Windows XP
Since Jun 2002: Intel Pentium III 600Mhz, 384Mb RAM, Windows 98 SE, 64Mb ATI Radeon 8500LE
Since May 2000: Intel Pentium III 600Mhz, 384Mb RAM, Windows 98 SE, Voodoo 3 3000 AGP
Blu-ray: 
I heard a lot of great things prior to watching Zombieland,
especially with the comparison to the exceptional
The film is presented in its original 2.40:1 anamorphic widescreen ratio and is highly-detailed with no problems.
For the record, I'm watching on a Panasonic 37" Plasma screen via a Samsung BD-P1500 Blu-ray player.
