Director: Ameera Al-Qaed
Year: 2013
Country: Bahrain
Alternate Titles: N/A
Genre: Zombie
Plot:
During a viral zombie outbreak, a random selection of people in a Bahraini town are forced to confront the possibility that they’re in the middle of a zombie apocalypse and must band together with several other groups of survivors in the area to get to safety away from the creatures.
Review:
Overall, this was a generally impressive indie zombie effort. One of the better elements of this one is a rather fun and enjoyable starting point that allows for as much of a workable zombie outbreak while also getting to see the country’s output. The central idea of the random group of friends living in the city slowly coming upon the virus running rampant through the city and are forced to come together to save themselves is a generally solid and unassuming way of getting all the necessary storyline ingredients together. With the episodic nature of the first half providing a way of getting to know each of the characters in their own individual storylines before coming across the creatures based on their situation, this allows the chance to see the various groups running around the city getting into their general scraps to move this along quite well.
That comes about in fine form with an energetic if somewhat oddly clumsy series of zombie attacks and confrontations. Starting with the first attack on the couple at their house involving several chases around the property before the final ambush, a secondary attack when a married couple is attacked by the creatures or the encounter at the mall where multiple groups of survivors are brought together, the action scenes themselves are pretty frenetic and enjoyable. Granted, there are times where it’s easy to see the low-budget nature of the production with the choreography featured but the fact that it’s actually quite bloody for what it is manages to help out quite nicely. It all leads nicely into the finale where the main group stuck in the mall is brought out into the main fight against the creatures who were trapped inside the whole time which sets up the kind of frantic race to get past them and out into the rest of the countryside that gets quite a lot of action and some fine blood and gore to give this a lot to like.
There are some minor drawbacks on display that keep this down. The main issue with the film is the overall sense of familiarity and the series of cliches this brings about during the film. The idea of this one getting a random group of people together and forcing them to put their differences aside, whether it be cultural, socioeconomically, or political, and try and survive a zombie apocalypse doesn’t have as much to differentiate itself from others out there beyond the idea of taking place in a new country. Being that it’s the first one attempted from the region, this can be excused somewhat but not outright since there’s little reason for it to rely on the cliches as much as it does here when it could’ve gone the route of a more culturally original production to offer up the kind of changes in the story that would make it feel different and unique. As well, there are also other issues involving the low budget already mentioned which also keep this one down.
Overview: ***/5
A fine first attempt from Bahrain to deliver a zombie feature, this one brings about some likable features while also being full of flaws that should be taken into account about its origins to determine whether it’s detrimental or not. Those who are curious about the country’s output or are just hardcore zombie film aficionados should give it a shot while those turned off by these factors should heed caution.
Comments
Post a Comment