We Are Zombies (RKSS, 2023) Review

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“The magnificent head spinning zombie dude!” The dead are back, rising from the grave; even the living aren't dying any more – but despite expectations, they're not into all that flesh gobbling malarkey … they're just here, getting under everyone's feet, but for how long?...

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“You know what's harsh? This dead meat asking me for change with gold teeth in his mouth!” With the undead – or “living impaired” as blue-haired protestors insist they be termed – back in action, the global population has exploded by 175%, low skill manual workers are being sacked in favour of outsourcing to the dead, and they're also claiming back their human rights. Now, for the hard-up working class, there's even fewer ways to scrape together a living. Even begging on the street isn't an option any more, yet another area of life where the dead have taken over.

But there are ways to scoop up a few bucks. Nerdy goofball Karl (Alexandre Nachi), lovelorn wrestling fan Freddy (Derek Johns, The Boys), and Karl's sarcastic half-sister Maggie (Megan Peta Hill, Riverdale) have a scheme going whereby they track calls to the Coleman corporation for 'undead extraction' services, and swoop in to take the job first (with cash in-hand) so they can sell the walking dead on the black market. However, when their Coleman rivals catch up with them, demanding $25,000 in recompense, Karl and company find themselves in a calamitous mess that spirals out of control.

“What are you, a zombophobe now?” With the populace aggravated that they're having to 're-learn' the way they live, now that the dead are back and not going anywhere any time soon, the wider story of We Are Zombies can be read as a comment on the current state of the world, from mass migration to transgenderism to corporate greed and societal manipulation, 'restructuring' the workforce, homelessness, extreme punditry, and the plight of the worker drone masses. However, instead of 'pulling a Disney', writers Jerry Frissen, Francois Simard, and Anouk Whissell (the latter two of whom co-direct with Yoann-Karl Whissell) steer clear of po-faced virtue signalling and keep their eye on pure entertainment, mixing broad ideas of zeitgeisty interest with crimson-tinged gore gags.

“I don't mind farts … farts are natural.” The ear of a zombie fry cook will wind up in your fast food, a burly henchman proves he simply cannot be trusted around firearms, while the response from a dead head getting entangled in the wheel well of a van elicits not anger, but world weary resignation – from the zombie itself! Then, of course, there's the notion of 'ZILF' smut, and the spectacularly inventive creations of Otto Maddox (Stéphane Demers), a performance artist who uses the dead as objects for his creations, much to the chagrin of the placard-wavers outside his cathedral to the macabre.

“I looked at my asshole once.” However, a big stumbling point for the film is that, at a mere 76 minutes before the credits roll, it's simply far too busy. To quote Joe Bob Briggs, 'there's too much plot getting in the way of the story'. For example, in the portion of the plot focusing on the Coleman corporation, you've got Bob Coleman (Guy Nadin) vs Hannity (Benz Antoine, Death Race) for control of the company, Hannity vs Stanley and Rocco in relation to stolen 'undead extraction' services, and the subplot about blink-and-you'll-miss-her Dr West and the secret gas. 

That alone is a fair bit of material, but then add in the three squabbling lead characters, their money-making scheme, their debt to Stanley and Rocco, the kidnapping and extortion problem, the job for Otto Maddox, and the ZILF angle … **catches breath** … well, you've got way too many flies buzzing around the corpse. As a result of all these conflicting chunks of intrigue, few (if any) of them get enough room to breathe, while all the 'big' stuff in the wider story continually overtakes the 'small' character moments. This latter point proves especially troublesome, leaving the protagonists stranded as fairly one-note characters who do little more than spout dialogue, enjoyably quirky though it may be.

“What kind of cheap shot fart knuckle asshole goes for your grandma?” Still, despite some decided flaws, the movie is certainly not without fits and starts of inventive entertainment. Maddox's religion-inspired art project is a gruesomely impressive design, Maggie's fumbled dispatching of a dead head (literally) with a shotgun is a guffaw-inducer, Freddy's alter ego as the 'Wild Gringo' adds unrestrained zaniness to the slightly sloppy climax, while a poorly-timed sneeze quite possibly takes the best laugh of the movie.

“I think I'm impaired too.” We Are Zombies makes for a generally fun time, but the very well-worn zombie genre has reached a point, currently at least, where there's little meat to pick from the bones. As such, the film cannot match RKSS' previous outings: Turbo Kid and Summer of '84. The latter, with its riff on Stranger Things vibes (boys cycling around their suburb, simultaneously on the brink of puberty and the cusp of something dark and disturbing) boasted genuine warmth and surprise as a nostalgic coming-of-age yarn veered suddenly into a nightmare. The former (think BMX Bandits meets Mad Max), was a funpocalypse in a kid's sandbox – with an added dose of splatterific gore – while still retaining a charming heart, much of it owed to fan favourite character Apple. WAZ, on the other hand, limits itself to snarky wit, a few flashes of creative verve, and a handful of wonderfully weird interludes, before stalling well short of its potential, ultimately lacking the spark of its predecessors.