Zombieland **** (2009, Jesse Eisenberg, Emma Stone, Woody Harrelson, Abigail Breslin, Bill Murray) – Classic Movie Review 788

Woody Harrelson gets solo top star billing above the title for director Ruben Fleischer’s deliciously crazy 2009 horror comedy Zombieland, then the highest grossing zombie movie in the US.

For the first time in ages (maybe ever!) Woody Harrelson gets solo top star billing above the title (he really must have a good agent!) for director Ruben Fleischer’s deliciously crazy 2009 horror comedy Zombieland that is the American Shaun of the Dead. It’s that good.

Harrelson teams up in a great, odd-couple double act with Jesse Eisenberg (from The Squid and Whale, Adventureland and The Social Network) as a pair of lonely layabouts who so far are managing to survive a near-future America overrun by flesh-craving zombies. Basically the duo either run like the clappers or shoot to kill!

Along the wasted, corpse-strewn road to California, the gun-toting Tallahassee (Harrelson) and the wussie college student Columbus (Eisenberg) desperately seek Twinkies (it’s Tallahassee’s obsession). Happily for the story, they meet a right pair of young con-girl sisters – Wichita (Emma Stone) and Little Rock (Abigail Breslin) – as well as the real Bill Murray, who is foolishly, it turns out, dressed up as a zombie.

Will Columbus get to Ohio to find out if his parents are still alive? Will the quartet find the supposed safe haven of a zombie-free LA amusement park? Will anyone trust any else long enough to survive the zombie mayhem?

Sometimes hilarious, sometimes hysterical, always funny, this is a total laugh riot. Rhett Reese and Paul Wernick are the screenwriters to praise. Stupendous script, guys! Truly odd couple Harrelson and Eisenberg (why would anyone have paired them up?) are an inspired hoot together and Murray’s five-minute cameo is a comedy gem. Only trouble is, at 88 minutes Zombieland is far too short. May we have a sequel immediately please!

Happily, Zombieland 2 has now been announced. But, unhappily in 2017, the script is ready but there is no official green light yet. Finally Zombieland: Double Tap was made in Atlanta from January to March in 2019, reuniting the gang 10 years after the first film. The title is a reference to rule number 2 in Zombieland.

Zombieland: Double Tap premiered in Los Angeles on 10 October 2019 and was released in the US on 18 October 2019 by Sony Pictures Releasing. Its $125 million worldwide gross surpassed the first film’s $102.4 million. The first film was the highest grossing zombie movie in the US until the release of World War Z (2013).

Eisenberg is playing Lex Luthor is Zack Snyder’s Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice, released on 25 March 2016, while Jeremy Irons plays butler Alfred Pennyworth.

© Derek Winnert 2014 Classic Movie Review 788 derekwinnert.com

Woody Harrelson teams up in a great, odd-couple double act with Jesse Eisenberg

Derek Graf plays Clown Zombie.