When I was 14, I wrote a novel in a 3-subject notebook titled, City of The Dead. Within 115 pages I told the story of a group of rag-tag mercenaries infiltrating a zombie-infested Las Vegas to steal a safe at the bottom of Ceasar’s Palace. For my own amusement, I named each member of the crew after my favorite rock stars. Danzig, Marriott, Lemmy, Reed, and Lennon had nothing in common except their need for payment. Sadly, I truly believed it would get me published and I’d be the Stephen King of my generation. Fast forward to 2021 and it has been adapted by Zack Snyder and retitled Army of The Dead.
Okay, well Army of The Dead isn’t officially an adaption of MY story, but it could’ve very well been! Either way, I’m willing to settle this matter outside of the courts.
Zack Snyder is currently one of the most polarizing directors in Hollywood. Part of that is the result of how he handles adaptions of intellectual properties. Most notably his troubled run with Warner Bros’ botched DC Universe. But long before legions of internet trolls were calling for his crucifixion or chanting Release The Snyder Cut!!, Snyder was planting the seeds of divisiveness. 2009’s Watchmen swapped Alan Moore’s infamous nihilism for almost self-referential pop culture indulgence. 2004’s remake of Dawn of The Dead stripped away all of George A. Romero’s subtle commentary on consumerism and replaced it with music video editing and XBOX action sequences.
Say what you want about Snyder, but he has a distinctive vibe with each film. Unfortunately, he doesn’t care if it services the story or not.
Without being tied to any pre-existing intellectual property, Army of The Dead comes as a breath of fresh air. However, a filmmaker can’t title a movie …of The Dead and not expect to draw comparisons with the beloved Romero films. But outside a vague convenient subplot about class warfare (and an eye-rolling cameo from Sean Spicer), a single Romero-ism is nowhere to be found. And while Army plays fast and loose with the established rules of the zombie genre, Snyder brings quite a bit of his own lore to the table making it much more interesting on paper.
Speaking of paper, Army of The Dead sports a massive runtime coming in at a whopping 148 minutes. But thankfully the story is relatively lean and focused. Maybe even to a fault, especially seeing as many of the world-building elements go absolutely nowhere. You’d think with so much time, there would be more fun to be had. As a stickler for editing, I could pinpoint nearly 40 minutes that could’ve easily been shaved right off the top or at least better devoted to some of the newly established lore.
Once again, Snyder is no stranger to over-indulgence, and the studio backing this film isn’t giving him any grief for it.
Much like my novel so many years ago, Army of The Dead centers around a team of mercenaries hired to collect some loot at the center of a zombie-ridden Las Vegas. Also like my novel, Army of The Dead is plagued with vapid writing that of a 14-year-old. For the record, I don’t know how old Snyder is, but I’m willing to bet he is long past puberty and probably doesn’t break out in acne when trying to talk to a member of the opposite sex. But I digress.
Lead by Dave Bautista, the cast isn’t even one of the worse elements of the film. Bautista does a well enough job during scenes of action and vulnerability. But it’s Tig Notaro who steals every scene with her deadpan charisma. This is strange considering she shot her scenes in post-production without the rest of the cast. Due to sexual misconduct allegations, the original actor, Chris D’Elia was fired from the film and replaced by Notaro. Like all good pop movies, the dynamics of the mercenaries take pages from Aliens as well as Snyder’s own cut of Justice League. In my head, I jokingly refer to Samantha Win’s character as Not-Vasquez.
Visually speaking, white knuckle action and gratuitous zombie violence have never looked better!
From explosive scenes of spectacle and tension to visceral depictions of blood and gore, every scene of action and horror delivers on all accounts. Snyder knows how to make utilize every second when it comes to call-and-response action. I’m not sure how one could mess up undead topless dancers or a zombified tiger anyway, but Snyder nailed it. Unfortunately, everything else falls short. Or at least I think it does anyway. Half the time you can barely even see what’s happening on screen due to his affixation with a field of depth focusing. And here’s where Snyder’s biggest issue comes into play. There’s no one to call him out on his over-indulgence.
Acting as director, writer, and producer means Snyder is wearing a lot of hats and gets to call the most important shots. But he also acts as the director of photography in Army of The Dead as well. Every single shot in the movie (outside the action sequences) is 75% out of focus and 25% in slow-motion. Sure, it looks super cool but it happens so often I felt like my screen was malfunctioning. Had there been a producer checking the dallies or a cinematographer on set, they would’ve said “Whoa, Zack. That looks cool but can we turn it back just a little? People wanna watch a movie, not question their vision.”
Essentially, Army of The Dead is Zack Snyder writing a love letter to Zack Snyder about Zack Snyder.
With visual aesthetics, exhausting runtime, and sidequests going absolutely nowhere, I can honestly see how Warner Bros. executives panicked during the Justice League shoot. I’m all for supporting auteurs but films deeply rooted in pop culture sort of need to follow some guidelines. Especially if you want to nail the correct tone. Removing a director may not be the best fix for it, but Army of The Dead makes a pretty good argument for the decision. Even more so when the film plays the most over-the-top antics completely straight. Aside from the Watchmen-esque opening credits, it’s a serious affair from start to finish.
Snyder is capable of making a good film. Watchmen, 300, and even portions of Dawn of The Dead prove that. But he needs someone to keep him in check. My notebook novel was laughably bad and a publisher would’ve humiliated me into never writing again had one ever read it. But I was a 14-year-old writing a story destined to rot in a shoebox. Snyder, a director with 10 blockbusters under his belt, was given nearly $100 million to write and direct a similar story with a multi-million dollar ad campaign along with worldwide distribution through Netflix.
The only difference? I’m humble enough to know trash when I see it even if it’s of my own creation.
Obviously, Snyder has been validated by yes-men and a cult-like toxic fandom for so long, even he believes he’s incapable of making a swollen, shallow, self-serving piece of candy-coated fecal matter such as Army of The Dead. If you’re looking for a stupid fun zombie movie without a soul, check out Snyder’s take on Dawn of The Dead. Better yet, play one of the old Dead Rising games for an hour or so. But even if you insist on Snyder’s brand of sensory stimulation, I think Army of The Dead will be easy to put down.
Just whatever you do, please aim for the head…
Army of The Dead is now currently streaming exclusively on Netflix