Warm Bodies

Zombies are currently very trendy. Not least due to the great success of the series The Walking Dead, the zombie apocalypse in various incarnations is currently extremely popular. However, the focus is usually on a few survivors who have to take on a superior force of undead driven by their hunger for human flesh. It's always the poor humans that the viewer is supposed to feel sorry for. But who thinks about the zombies? A slowly rotting undead doesn't have it easy either. Fortunately, there is Jonathan Levine (50/50 - Friends for Life), who finally approaches the subject from the perspective of a zombie in Warm Bodies.

The humorous adaptation of the novel of the same name by Isaac Marion focuses on the zombie R (Nicholas Hoult), who spends his everyday life as an undead in an airport building. Only to forage for food do R and his fellow zombies leave their deserted home, hoping to find fresh human brains somewhere out there in the post-apocalyptic world. When they eat it, it not only fills them with renewed strength and satisfies their hunger. They also absorb the memories of their victims. This is what happens when R feasts on the brain of young Perry (Dave Franco). All at once he feels a deep affection for the attractive Julie (Teresa Palmer), who is also in the group that R and the other zombies have attacked. Without further ado, R rescues the girl and hides her in his secret refuge, a decommissioned Boeing 747. And there the unbelievable happens: during the days in which Julie is hidden by R from the other zombies, a kind of friendship develops between the two, as Julie realizes that her undead savior is much more than just a soulless monster. And R senses changes, too, as his guttural grunts turn more and more into intelligible words. Could it really be that Julie is making him more human again? And how will she react when she learns that R has eaten her ex-boyfriend?

Warm Bodies isn't really a horror film, but an amusing variation on the classic Romeo & Juliet motif - only with zombies. Levine largely eschews blood and gore effects (although there should certainly be those in a later home-theater version) in favor of humor, charm, and very original ideas. When R comments on his zombie existence and all the inconveniences it entails in a wonderfully frustrated off-screen manner, it makes for some extremely good laughs, especially at the beginning. But also the amusing play with some worn out genre clichés and the wonderfully coordinated use of 80s rock songs makes the film quite a pleasure to watch. Levine rarely goes for big laughs, but relies more on restrained gags and the charming-amusing mood, which works much better than a non-stop gag-fireworks.

Next to the original script, the film also convinces with its set and the simple, but good effects. And the good actors then also finally ensure that the in itself completely absurd story works so well. Especially Nicholas Hoult (About a Boy, X-Men: First Decision) manages perfectly to fill his undead character with life in such a way that, despite his deadly hunger for brains, the audience's sympathy is guaranteed from the very first moment. How easily this unusual romance could have seemed ridiculous or the finale unbearably cheesy. But because the script, the staging and the play of the performance mesh perfectly and always hit the right note, Warm Bodies has not become a bad joke, but a really good film.

Telling the story from the point of view of a zombie is admittedly not a new idea. For example, the horror-comedy Wasting Away - Zombies are only human, too, was already presented from this unusual perspective. Nevertheless, Jonathan Levine's romantic zombie comedy is an extremely original, charming, funny and simply beautiful work that all fans of unusual genre works should definitely not miss. Definitely worth seeing

An article by Frankfurt-Tipp