What World War Z got right and very, very wrong

I saw World War Z last night in the theaters and yes, you can add me to the list of people who did not like it. But rather than just throw out the blanket "The book was better," I've decided to break it down. Because I feel the need to stress that the movie did do a couple of things rather well. Rather well, that is, if the movie had been called "Brad Pitt Makes a Zombie Cash-In." (*** Spoiler warning in advance ***)

Right 1: Defending the PG-13 rating: Yup. I'll defend this. If you recall the "source material" (I use that term with massive air quotes) the focus isn't really on the zombies or the carnage they're inflicting. It's more about people's reactions to, and dealing with them. Very little page space is given to actual gore. I feel as though in recent years, zombies have become a campaign for directors to out-gore one another and that takes away a lot of the horror from them. Zombies' roots are purely in psychological horror and you don't need an R rating for that if you do it right. 

Right 2: Panic, sheer, bloody panic. One of the things that makes Max Brooks' novel so successful is that he accurately displays the panic of this unknown enemy. The beginning sequence captures this rather well. Children are still rare in post-apocalyptic fantasies, and it's nice to see a movie tackle that head-on, even if the younger daughter displayed touches of Carl Syndrome.

Right 3: The airplane sequence. As far as the worst, possible place to be in event of a zombie outbreak, a plane is near the top of the list. This sequence, while woefully predictable, had the right amount of tension and panic. Also, Pitt's solution was smart, and the director handled it correctly. That is to say, he didn't have zombies still making their way toward him, despite the tremendous winds/depressurization.

Okay now that's out of the way, onto the bad. The oh, so very bad.

Bad 1: The Reluctant Hero. Oh, how I loathe this plot device. Actually loathe. Upon discovering he's the best man suited to fight the zombie plague (yeah, more on this in a bit), Pitt's first reaction is to play the "No, I'm a family man," card. Stop. Now. This is unacceptable. The fate of the entire world, which, for the record, you are currently inhabiting, rests in your hands, and you want to play the "it's not my problem" card?

This is problematic because not only does it make the hero look short-sighted, it also makes him appear selfish and, frankly, petulant. Worse yet is when the director then shows the wife, crying saying "No, I can't let you do this." Oh good, we have two foolish people. We're off to a good start!

Bad 2: Chechnya and zombies have a lot in common. He investigated war crimes in Chechnya for the UN, so this makes him the perfect man for this job. Really. This doesn't even make sense. At no point in the movie are we shown a single skill that proves he is the man for this job. He doesn't appear to be a great combatant, he doesn't appear to be a leader, and he doesn't even appear to be that great of an investigator (he trips into all of his "clues"). His only marketable skill appears in Jerusalem, where he is shown to have 20/20 vision while everyone surrounding him is Mr. Magoo.

Bad 3: Mother nature is a serial killer: Worst. Speech. Ever.

Behold a pale sweater, and the name that said on it was Death.

Bad 4: Brad Pitt is the Angel of Doom: Another plot device I'm sick of: everywhere the hero goes, he brings death with him.  Like a regular Jessica Fletcher, everywhere Brad Pitt goes in this movie, immediately after arrival, people are going to get killed for some unbelievably dumb reason, like, say, a phone call. Please don't try the "the wife had no way of knowing" defense with me. Her husband is on an exceptionally dangerous, covert mission. I would expect her to have the common sense to know to wait for a damn phone call.(More on the Jerusalem bit later)

Bad 5: CGI zombies. Whether or not you like fast zombies may be a personal preference thing. Personally, I don't mind them when they're done well. For instance, in 28 Days Later, which popularized the fast zombie, they're often seen in fast moving hordes of extras. Extras. That means real people. Not only did the movie change Brooks' traditional, shambling zombie into the fast variety, they employ an embarrassing amount of CGI. Look at the Jerusalem sequence. Rather than looking like a realistic, fast-moving crowd of undead, it looks like a ridiculous tidal wave of, well, water. In these shots they don't move like people or animals but rather an amorphous, fluid being which just isn't scary. On their own, they were handled well. In a group, they become unmanageable and fuzzy. I relate this to any time a horror movie relegates all of its ghostly horror in an end sequence with a giant, black, smoke monster.

Bad 6: Jerusalem. In the novel, there are bastions of civilization which were prepared for the plague, or handled it in a brutally efficient way. I liked this concept. Watching Jerusalem fall because of both a dumb plot device and a tidal wave of CGI zombies was just disappointing.

Bad 7: The "Cure." Oh, naturally there will just be a miraculous cure (in this case, camouflage) in the movie so that Brad Pitt can be the messiah character. Needless to say, this doesn't appear in the book. No, the book went for something far more dramatic and, dare I use the word, "edgy." There is a delicious irony, well-crafted and expertly executed by Brooks, in having the "savior" of mankind being an old racist member of apartheid Africa. He presents us with this despicable character who created an unthinkable plan for dealing with a native African uprising, its sole purpose to save the white population.

Terrible, right? And this is the plan which will prove to turn the tide in the war of mankind vs. the undead. There was a subtle, necessary evil to this plan that makes it so effective in Brooks' hands. Instead, the movie went for a safe, deus ex machina, or in this case, virus ex machina. But more about that in:

From Pitt's Jump to Conclusions Mat, Tom's safe!

Bad 8: Jump to conclusions mat: So Brad Pitt sees a soldier with an injured leg, an elderly man and a scrawny kid avoided by zombies and from this, he is able to conclude that a potent virus is what will cure mankind. Let's break this slippery slope down, shall we?

A soldier with a bum leg. We don't know why he has a bum leg, but let's assume it's some type of muscular- or bone-related injury which probably occurred on-duty. With a limp that noticeable, I find it hard to believe he would get through boot camp. That is not terminal. He's a professional soldier meaning that he's probably in better health than 70% of the population that we watch the zombies tear through. But the bum leg prevents them from attacking him. By this logic, shouldn't the Israeli soldier with Pitt be totally safe because she's missing her hand?  Zombies are able to run on broken legs, I wouldn't think a limp would stop them.

An elderly man. From looking at this old man, what possible illness would Pitt's character be able to determine, other than old age? Okay, so do the zombies avoid old people because they're going to die soon? So from this, we should conclude that all old people should be okay, right? No, because we saw a few elderly zombies. Oh boy...

An unhealthily thin child. Calling him unhealthily thin is a stretch, but I'm giving the movie the benefit of the doubt here. What ailment would Pitt be able to determine from this boy's frame other than, possibly, malnourishment? So they don't like malnourished people. Wouldn't this mean that a large portion of the world would be safe? Kate Moss must be relieved (har har, I'm here all week)! 

None of these people have anything in common -- old age, thinness and a bum leg. From this random mix of evidence, Pitt's conclusion should be that they don't like people who aren't 100% healthy. Instead, he makes a massive leap of logic and assumes they have a terminal illness. (Boy, I'd love to see how he investigated war crimes... "I'll just assume this is irrefutable proof!") Truth be told, this is almost identical to Jeff Goldblums "give the aliens a virus" plan. Congratulations, WWZ, you just matched wits with Independence Day.

Bad #8: The budget called, it's leaving. After displaying large, flashy set pieces, that the movie ends on such an anticlimactic note wreaks of budget problems. Which is a shame given that the movie didn't need most of what we saw. Instead it just feels like a big budget action movie which is cut short in the name of wrapping it up with a bow.

I think what bothers me the most about this is that it's clearly an example of wanting to cash-in on a popular, well-liked name. World War Z the book is (in my opinion) a modern classic and has earned its place in the hallows of zombie canon. The name alone undoubtedly did half the work for them. Which is disgraceful.

Try to imagine if someone decided to make a movie called The Catcher in the Rye. It stars a young, dejected man with a hat, unsure of his place in the world as he battles Mexican drug cartels through Jack Ryan-style political espionage (SPLOSIONS!) with not so subtle commentary on evil pharmaceutical companies. Oh, did I mention the hat is CGI?

Ayup.