Independent Film

Imagine one day that all the dead come back to life, and they march en masse through your city, seeking equality and justice and fair pay; not brains or mindless vengence, they seem happy to just pick up where they left off. The dead go back to work, and back to their lives, and face some amount of resistance from the living who are concerned by these corpses wanting to take away their jobs.

The french call in the Red Cross, where others might just send in the soldiers to slash and burn these monstrosities, the French are a caring sort, and they house and feed the dead, providing counselling and medical staff to study the different physiologies of the dead.

The citizens are happy enough to see their kids and wives and family, but they’re not stupid - they have seen the zombie movies, and they keep a close eye out for brain eatting. The living dead are being more and more marginalized, placed into menial jobs, and kept as a pet would be; locked in the house to prevent them wandering off. These undead are restless… awake at night, wandering; apparently looking for something…

Overall, it’s a pretty slow movie, with dialogue not being as central to the movie’s development as the acting and the photography. It’s a good French movie, and as is typical of the breed, it builds slowly and the end happens without explanation or apology. It is not the type of movie that will appeal to anyone who needs an answer; there’s no answers to any of the why’s. There are things in life that we can’t explain, and that we just accept; the appearance of the living dead is one of those things that must be accepted; it’s not even touched on in the film. It’s a good film, but you likely need to be in a certain frame of mind to enjoy this sort of film.

I’m reminded of another French film I saw this past fall; Le Temps du loup where the unseen and unexplained dangers make the film even more menacing; there’s little time for exposition. The characters in the film all know what’s going on, so they don’t feel the need to explain the obvious issues at hand.

“Perhaps the dead did not really return. The return of the dead is simply their reluctance to disappear completely. Simply a residual effect… that the living have trouble shaking loose.” — Robin Campillo (director)