If the strength of early hype was ever anything to go one, World War Z would win Oscars. Multiple Oscars. However, some odd re-drafts and re-shoots of the third act may have muddied the waters a little. With this said, I still reckon the first trailer looks mind-shattering, and I'm not even familiar with Max Brooks' immensely popular source novel.
Starring Brad Pitt as a UN employee who scours the globe for information concerning a sudden zombie outbreak that threatens an apocalypse, World War Z has named the Bourne trilogy and The Walking Dead as touchstones for a gritty, realistic look at the occurrence and aftermath of an undead pandemic. Those behind the camera are top notch. Director Marc Forster has shown that he can handle action (I enjoyed Quantum of Solace's action despite the overuse of shaky-cam - the opening car chase in particular was tops) and darkly sensitive stuff (Monster's Ball). Cinematographer Robert Richardson is one of my all time favourites from his extensive work with Tarantino and Scorcese. Composer Marco Beltrami carved himself a nice horror niche via his collaborations with Wes Craven. Editor Matt Chesse worked on QoS with Forster and the criminally under-seen Warrior. But it's the writers that are most intriguing...
Originally written up by J. Michael Straczynski, the initial script had Ain't It Cool News asking 'whether or not a zombie movie qualifies as 'Best Picture' material'. Wowsers. It was then retooled by Matthew Michael Carnahan, which could be good or bad depending on how you look at it - I loved State of Play but he also popped out Lions for Lambs (yawn). But the studio - having seen the ending - brought in Damian Lindelof (who totally dropped the ball on Prometheus) to have another crack at it, but after coming up with a plan, he then diverted the actual writing to Drew Goddard (who totally caught the ball on Cabin in the Woods). It's a long story, but the motto is that we have no idea how this is going to turn out. However, don't be too worried about the re-shoots, because they're actually remarkably common in big films where studios are investing mega-millions.
The trailer (which is what really galvanised me to write this one up for the blog) rocks. I love the whole idea of swarming zombies as opposed to the regular shuffling idiots - take a peek below:
World War Z will be released June 21, 2013, and it could be the next big thing. Or it could not... Either way, Paramount are hoping it's gonna take in some serious dollars at the box office.
No comments:
Post a Comment