WE BURY THE DEAD (2024)

New streaming on Hulu from NEON Films and Vertical Entertainment!
Directed/Written by Zak Hilditch.
Check out the
trailer here! !

Daisy Ridley plays Ava, who volunteered to be a part of the body clean-up after the US accidentally detonated an experimental bomb over Tasmania, causing mass casualties. Ava’s husband was within the blast radius, and her real goal is to get past the military borders to see if her husband survived or at least to recover his body. Ava pairs up with Clay (Brenton Thwaites) to get past the military and into the forbidden zones. But they soon find themselves ill-prepared for what horrors lay ahead.

I always hate it when early word about a movie is negative and I skip watching it and then it turns out the film is actually pretty good. That’s the case with WE BURY THE DEAD. While the film isn’t a thrill-a-minute, it does fill the spaces with utter dread and suspense. Ava’s quest is a dire one. It is most likely that she is on this mission to find the dead body of her husband. Still, this noble quest gives her something to cling to in this time of global catastrophe. That’s what this story is about. Holding on to something until it’s time to finally let go in a time when everything else makes no sense. It’s a universal concept and makes for a compelling motivation.

Ridley shows much more range here than she ever did in the STAR WARS movies. Here she must face horrifying odds and emotionally devastating truths. The actress can act. She just hasn’t had any films to challenge her in this way, or at least in anything I’ve seen. Here she is tough as nails and determined, but always almost to the point of completely breaking down.

The zombies themselves are rather unique. They are in a harmless state for a while, then evolve into walking threats and eventually begin running if they are given enough time. What really differentiates them from other denizens of the undead is that they chomp and grind their teeth. This sound offers up a visceral feel. Grinding one’s teeth is awful anyway—an old girlfriend did this while she was sleeping and it used to make me squirm. Add in a growing appetite for flesh and you’ve got one gnarly zombie.

The film reaches a logical, almost Romero-esque end where the zombies continue to evolve into something a little more than brainless hunks of meat. This idea tracks as the zombies have been evolving all through the film-changing from basically pieces of furniture to a real threat. And while I won’t reveal the fate of Ava’s husband, her quest comes to a fitting end once all the cards are on the table. It all ends quite dramatically and hit me hard, mainly due to Ripley’s performance.

Of course, as with most zombie films, man is the most dangerous threat, as evidenced by a twisted sequence in the third act. This is going to turn a lot of folks off as this scene is quite depraved, but I was impressed the film went into this gruesome territory.

I guess the lesson to learn here is to not trust the critics. Not even me, even though I try to be deaf to the hype machine. WE BURY THE DEAD is a solid zombie film. And while there still are plenty of zombie films made, few are worth mentioning. WE BURY THE DEAD truly is.