'Army of the Dead' movie review: A better zombie, an almost better film

Zack Snyder's Army of the Dead will sate any fan who seeks violent zombie action, with a good heist plot to go with it - but it is not without its flaws

Army of the Dead

Director: Zack Snyder

Cast: Dave Bautista, Tig Notaro, Matthias Schweighöfer

Score: 3.5 stars

If you follow Zack Snyder's film-making, you know he is a big fan of using a few tricks: Gratuitous violence, an absolute bonkers plot and incredibly creative camerawork, if nothing else. Many of his films tick these boxes, and Army of the Dead is yet another entry into this list.

Before you wonder, Army of the Dead has nothing to do with the 2008 movie of the same name by Joseph Contegiacomo, or Snyder's own Dawn of the Dead. It instead, veers closer in its use of zombies as a plot point to something like World War Z, but instead of a global zombie pandemic, it confines itself - literally and figuratively - to a heist inside an abandoned Las Vegas.

The film has a colourful set of characters. Well, they're closer to being tropes than characters, and the film gets points for being remarkably self-aware of itself in that front. There's the leader, Scott Ward (Dave Bautista); the helicopter pilot, Marianne Peters (Tig Notaro), the safecracker, Ludwig Dieter, (Matthias Schweighöfer); the tag-along, Scott's daughter Kate Ward (Ella Purnell); the soldier and the token dead man walking. Fortunately, the black man dies first trope does not apply for once.

The basic plot is that this team is brought together to go into an abandoned Las Vegas hotel/casino, steal $200 million from the safe underneath for an eccentric and possibly engaging-in-grifting Japanese businessman Bly Tanaka (a very uninspired name for Hiroyuki Sanada's character, to be sure).

In terms of having gratuitous action and violence, this might just be Snyder's most ambitious film since 300. In terms of having an absolute bonkers plot, it's probably the closest he's gotten to Sucker Punch, but it is, surprisingly, a remarkably tame attempt by Snyder at doing creative things with a camera - at least when compared to Justice League.

Coming back to the plot, the heist sees this gang make its way into a walled-off Las Vegas with the help of a smuggler through a quarantine zone. It is there where the film really spreads its legs and introduces an original concept to the zombie genre: using a sacrifice to earn passage through the zombie-infested city. No need to blow zombies up to get to your target, just let one person die and walk right in. Easy-peasy.

This little plot mechanic is enabled by Snyder's use of so-called Alphas, zombies that make decisions for the colony. It's here that the film's most startling revelation comes in and the plot really gets going: The zombies have a society, which simultaneously makes the heist easier and harder.

This being a zombie movie, nothing would sit right if there wasn't a lot of human vs zombie violence, and there is a lot of that. It's bloody, it's brutal and it involves everything from shooting to face-ripping and explosions. To those who look for a brutally violent zombie film, this will more than meet their expectations, and fortunately, it does not come in the way of the progress of the central heist plot.

One of the few weak points of the film is the characters themselves. The characters are something more than just tropes with a bit of personality, which normally would make them endearing, but the film tacks on emotional baggage to some of them, which really takes away from the whole scope of the film.

This is particularly true for Scott and Kate, the former of whom appear to want to fix their relationship - while the latter really is obsessed with saving the mother of two kids who was foolish enough to venture into the zombie-infested city. The emotional and mental clash between the two's personalities is the biggest irritant in what is otherwise a pretty good film.

Another irritant is the long runtime of the film. While 2.5 hours doesn't seem too long by modern standards, the film could do with maybe 10-15 minutes less of unnecessarily dragging action and emotional plot points, and just move along with the plot. Curiously, some of the zombies also appear to be sympathetic creatures for once, and not just a mindless horde bent on death.

To close, Army of the Dead is a fairly decent entry into the zombie genre by Zack Snyder. It does some original things, its cast is pretty decent and the action is mostly top-notch, but the attempts at using emotional grounding and some dragging of the action kind of weigh it down from being truly good.