Film Review: The Dead Don't Die.

The Dead Don’t Die: Jim Jaemusch’s star studded zom-com-a-soc-com.

(zombie comedy and social commentary)

The cast isstar studded, often making the film feel like a feature length SNL skit, with all the cameos, but less of the chaos. There is a sense that the cast, while understanding the jokes, aren’t quite in on them however. One of the major traps of this kind of film, and there have been countless, is that the higher the budget, and more prestigious the talent, the greater the chance of coming off hypocritical and lacking in self awareness. And, I’m afraid The Dead Don’t Die is probably one of the least self aware films that I have come across. It is possible that the cast as it is is being used ironically, and that Jaemusch is trying to convey the inherent problems with rich, entitled actors denigrating the rich and entitled, however, I doubt it. There is some acknowledgement that the characters are aware that they are in a film, however this is only lightly used, and feels like a piece of meta that has been shoehorned in. The closest we get to any sort of self awareness is the use of Selena Gomez, finding out that being a pop star doesn’t necessarily save you from the end of the world. 

Overall, I get the sense that The Dead Don’t Die would like to think itself ironic. The biggest irony however, is the juxtaposition of it’s forced appreciation for the zombie genre with its gross mishandling of the already well trodden path of consumerism and ‘the real zombies are the capitalists’ trope. There is certainly not much new here, and at the point where the audience is supposed to realise the whole thing is really all about capitalism (wink wink), anyone who has even a passing interest in the work of George Romero will be eye rolling to the point of exhaustion. There are several Romero and zombie horror related easter eggs to spot, but their obviousness, that matches the obviousness of the morality tale itself, only serves to underscore Jaemusche’s apparent unfamiliarity with the genre. 

There are positives however. Despite my rather snarky objections above, the film often feels extremely watchable and interesting. One thing it does get right, which so often Zombie films completely ignore, is the sense of comfort that the capitalism element brings. In George Romero’s 1978 classic, Dawn of the Dead, one of the keys to it’s success is the way in which the audience is complicit with the cast, hiding away yet slowly becoming trapped in the capitalist environment, forcing the audience to ask, along with the characters, who are the real monsters? In The Dead Don’t Die, this is replicated and is one of the key successes of the film. The small town vibe, and attractive lifestyle of its occupants is a chill ride, as we travel through it with Bill Murray and Adam Driver’s characters, and as events come to pass, the audience gets a sense of where things are going wrong. It is frustrating that the script is so heavy handed, because more subtlety in the right places would have improved matters exponentially.

Overall, The Dead Don’t Die is a curiosity among Zombie lore. A very late to the party, over and generally mis-cast take on ‘Zombies are slaves to capitalism and also the cast and audience are capitalists’ genre (for it is oversaturated enough to be its own genre now I feel). It has its charms, and has excellent cinematography. Bill Murray is always worth a watch, but although part of his schtick is that of an aloof actor phoning in performances randomly these days, it works quite well here, making me wonder if he at least is in on the joke more than one might think. 

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