World Ends at Camp Z

Yes, there is a lot of things they could have tried better. I'm gonna talk about the good stuff, yes it is a Zombie Flick. LOVE THAT. I see what they were trying to do on such a low budget. I am guessing they used a lot of their friends and friend's stuff. Really liked the area they did the filming in, very beautiful indeed. If I was stuck in the middle of a Zombie Apoc, some where like there would have been great. The real real real bad criticism I have to state upon, is that it took a realllllll long time to get to anything.

Well, I have to admit that when I stumbled upon this 2021 movie here in 2022, and seeing that it was a zombie movie, then of course I needed no persuasion to sit down and watch it. Sure, I had not even heard about this movie from writer Diane Janna and director Ding Wang, but it being a zombie movie was all that I needed to know.

The movie's cover/poster seemed interesting, but it was actually overselling the movie, because the movie itself was rather mundane and generic. But hey, I managed to get through it on the account of it being a zombie movie. However, if you are a zombie aficionado like me, then this is hardly an outstanding foray into the zombie genre.

The storyline in "World Ends at Camp Z" is pretty straight forward. In fact, the storyline is rather simplistic and doesn't bring anything new to the zombie genre. Of course it is a spin-off on the worldwide pandemic that we are still struggling with in real life, just made into a tale of the reanimated dead. So you're not exactly in for a grand cinematic experience here.

The acting performances in "World Ends at Camp Z" were a bit wooden for the most parts. There were some performances that stood out and helped to make the movie watchable. But you're not in for an award-winning performance here.

With "World Ends at Camp Z" being a zombie movie, then you might be disappointed with the zombies in the movie being fast, agile runners with their faces painted gray - but forgetting to paint the exposed skin on the neck down - and bleeding from their eyes. A strange type of zombie in my opinion. Then again, I am not a fan of running zombies, nor of subpar make-up just limited to the face. Nor am I a fan of zombies that stop dead in their track when they come before a body of water.

For me then "World Ends at Camp Z" came and went without as much as a groan or a bite. And if you are a fan of the zombie genre, then this is not really a movie that I would recommend you spend your time on.

My rating of director Ding Wang's 2021 zombie movie "World Ends at Camp Z" lands on a generous four out of ten stars.

Plot

During the pandemic, the present camp owner is forced to entertain the new buyer then learns of his evil intentions towards the land. In order to stop the sale he has tricks up his sleeve but a zombie uprising was never one of them.

Cast

Not familiar with anyone involved and nobody stood out.

Verdict

I was alarmed at the low rating before I even pressed play, I've had a lot of instances of this recently and to be fair to the IMDB community there tended to be a reason! But what could it be here? I assumed it was another instance of the spoiled viewers expecting a blockbuster and being frustrated with a low budget effort, that may be partially true.

You see straight away you notice everything looks fine, everything is competent, it develops very slowly but that's okay and I was engaged with the film and the story they were trying to tell. I scratched my head confused at the low rating and then it happened, the first "Action" sequence. You see when the zombie appear (No spoilers here it's a zombie movie!) there are two major problems. First of all the zombies look naff, visually everything in film looks great but the zombies are simply not on the same level so that's a real shame. Second, whenever action occurs they implement a filter that I can only describe as 5fps where everything slows, gets jittery and just looks positively awful.

So I found myself dreading the zombie sequences because they ruined what was otherwise a passable enough film, yes it's slow but it was competent. The rest of the film once everything goes to hell, is cliched, generic and ugly and that's such as shame because I found myself really wanting to like it.

Rants

What were they thinking with that filter/effect? It really is the absolute pits. I'm sure they felt like they had to counter the lack of budget but ironically it made the movie look and feel even more cheap. Night filters are common and dreadful, this right here SO much worse. Without that the zombies still would have looked terrible, but the film would have been a lot more tolerable!

The Good

Surprisingly well made initially Passable cast

The Bad

Zombies are very cheaply made That darn filter!

Very slow burner Falls on too many uninspired cliches.

I could barely make it through this movie because despite the plot (middling), the actors were SO BAD. I'm literally typing in other words just so that IMDB will let me tell you how bad the acting was.

With all the constraints that this movie has it could have been a lot worse.

The acting and direction is bad. However, the basic story and set up is done quite well. There are some good drone shots and effective lighting. The zombie slo mo is overdone thesedays.