Shaun of the Dead

This is part of my section on alternative film recommendations, check out the Films to See category for other recommendations.

Zombie movies aren’t something I usually make a beeline for I must confess, but Shaun of the Dead is different. The filmmakers argue that it’s actually a Zom Rom Com (i.e. a Zombie Romantic Comedy), and that’s pretty much what it is. Simon Pegg plays Shaun, an average bloke with no career, no prospects and a leisure schedule that includes going to his local pub, the Winchester, and nothing else. Fed up with this, his girlfriend, who wants something more from life, breaks up with him. Shaun goes on a bender and wakes up to find a large percentage of the population has become zombies. He sets about getting the people he cares and taking them to a safe place, the Winchester.

The British sense of humour prevails and hilarity ensues. There are some superbly funny scenes, with the lads (Shaun and his best mate Ed) thumbing through Shaun’s record collection to find albums to use as offensive weapons against a couple of zombies in their back garden. Three of the group beat a zombie with pool cues in time to a Queen track later in the movie and the lads stop to check on a horribly mutilated guy they have just run over only to find he was a zombie, thankfully.

All in all, it’s a fun movie that pokes fun at the stereotypes of the genre, but is really about the characters and how they develop throughout the film.