When I first heard about this I was actually thinking it would be a shocking low budget parody, a bit of fun cashing in on Big Brother and Halloween. I was right but this was much more than I expected. Shocking, yes, but shocking in a good way, not the bit of fake blood and bit of crappy makeup that I thought we would see.
Actually if this got to the cinema screens I would be quite happy to have paid my had earned cash and sat in the cinema for nearly 2 1/2 hrs.
Kelly (Jamie Winstone – Kidulthood) is a production runner working on a fictional series of Big Brother who finds herself trying to fend off the walking dead alongside her producer boss Patrick (Andy Nyman, Severance), boyfriend Riq (Riz Ahmed, Britz) and the remaining Big Brother house mates.
The novel aspect of this Zombie movie is the whole Big Brother thing which was extremely well directed / cut – but unfortunately at the end of the day it just mimicked the classic George A Romero films, and ultimately added little to the genre that began 40 years ago.
The characters were zombie movie stereotypes, the plot never went into the cause of the walking dead, there was nothing really original in the whole plot, but viewing (either in one sitting – or over several nights) was compelling.
A big congratulations to Davina McCall as I didn’t realise that she could act. And to teh actor Kevin Eldon who easily managed to shrug his comedy actor image to give a great performance in an unfortunately stunted character
Saying that (with my critical head on) I must admit that I really enjoyed it.
I would love to see the same ensemble next Halloween, but doing slightly more than a novel spin on a classic genre.
PS real zombies don’t run, their ankles would snap!