The Rezort

Lets be honest, there have been some truly awful B grade Zombie flicks. Thankfully, Rezort is not one of them.

Yes this film has a modest budget and location and yes, its hardly original. That said what Rezort does, it does with a simple, honest, gnashing enthusiasm. Its pacing is good and whilst this is not going to engage the synapses all that much it does engage on a sensory level, with lots of action and a few mild scares.

Just as importantly, its a competent production that employs some capable Brit actors and utilizes reasonable if not exceptional sets and locations.

All in all there a lot more to like here than not, if you are a fan of the Zombie/survival horror genre and you want an afternoon or evenings chill out action flick fun. Seven out of ten from me.

After humanity wins a war against zombies, tourists are able to kill zombies for sport at the Rezort.

Director Steve Barker who debuted with Outpost (2008) offers a zombie flick which echoes

Westworld (1973)and Jurassic Park (1993) premise. While Rezort isn't as tight as Outpost, quite choppy in fact the zombie resort idea is a winning formula. Despite some dubious casting and dialogue this modest budget horror has plenty of great zombie action. Its Island setting gives it an throw back feel to Fulci's Zombie (1979) and Fear the Walking Dead (in which Dougray Scott also appeared) rather than Romero's 'of the Dead' films and/or The Walking Dead series.

To writers Paul Gerstenberger's credit there is an interesting novel aspect as guest Melanie, played glowingly by Jessica Elise De Gouw who wants to conquer her psychological issues caused by the zombie war. This take is clearly what brought Barker and Scott's talent to the table. That said, it feel rushed in places especially when the park's security begins to unravel. The on location shoot works in its favour and Gerstenberger comes up trumps with a social commentary of sorts around refugees and class reminiscent of The Dead (2010), The Dead 2 (2013) and WWZ (2013) to name a few.

As forgettable sub characters get picked off one by one Martin McCann is notable as Lewis, but Dougray Scott effortlessly steals any sort of screen presence from the rest of cast excluding De Gouw of course who plays the trouble everyday girl in a horrific situation well. There's no lack of effort in the makeup department either, the effects are finely executed from the most part, rapid head shots, zombie bites, all the zombie staples are there. But technically there's some short comings in the editing and staging notable when the group try to pass through a fence damaged by a jeep it loses its lustre and logic.

With Resident Evil (2002) Hive like rooms and an impending countdown to doom. Its far from a DTV or SYFY film. The issue with Rezort is not that its derivative, it's just not slick enough or able to focus on a potential bleak tone or its unique and interesting aspects making it feel more like the entertaining Cockney Versus Zombies (2012) without the comedy rather than the Day of the Dead it should be.

Still the Michael Crichton themes with robots and dinosaur replaced for zombies makes Rezort worth watching just for the living dead hell of it.

Zombie films are pretty common place these days with the sub-genre being saturated with entries. So expectations are generally pretty low when a new one comes around the block. This rule of thumb applies to The Rezort. But I have to say that this one keeps things a little more interesting than usual. The set-up about a high-tech resort where adrenaline mad tourists can visit to shoot zombies is a pretty good new angle for the genre; even if it essentially borrows heavily from Michael Crichton penned sci-fi classics Westword (1973) and Jurassic Park (1993), especially when we have the zombies breaking free and causing all manner of horrors on the humans in a very similar way to what the androids and dinosaurs did in those two earlier films. Still, I didn't really mind this derivative aspect very much as at least it seemed – to me at least – to be a new angle for the zombie film.

For those who are interested in the distinction, this is one of the ones which has fast zombies. They bomb about in hot pursuit of the protagonists and you can probably imagine that it ends in tears for almost everyone. There is a little bit of political subtext added to the mix as well with a revelation later in the film involving refugees, which of course taps into a current issue in a zombie tradition that goes all the way back to George A. Romero. But mainly, this is a nicely distinctive new entry into an over-populated sub-genre. All things considered, I thought it was pretty good.

After an apocalyptic zombie outbreak, where more than two-billion people died, the worldwide situation is under control and the creatures have been destroyed. The cities are being rebuilt and there are camps of refugees kept by donation of the survivors. However, there is an isolated island where The Rezort, owned by Wilton (Claire Goose), is located and guests may participate in Zombie Safari to shoot the undead that are kept behind electric fences and locks monitored 24 hours/ day for sport of therapy. When the new guests arrive, a group go for camping in an isolated area of the compound. However there is a breach in the computer system caused by the guest Sadie (Elen Rhys) that used an encrypted flash drive in the computer system. The responsible for the computer system Salva (Shane Zaza) hides the information to fix later, but there is a virus that corrupts the files and releases the zombies, activating a protocol to destroy the island. Most of the staff and guests are killed in the main building; but the group formed by Archer (Dougray Scott), Melanie (Jessica De Gouw), her boyfriend Lewis (Martin McCann), the teenager Jack (Jassa Ahluwalia), Sadie and the guide Nevins (Kevin Shen) survives and seek a boat to leave the island before destruction. What is the purpose of Sadie and will the group survive?

"The Rezort" is a full of action and entertaining zombie film despite the rip-off of the storyline of Jurassic Park and how zombies are produced. The production is great with good cast, including Dougray Scott. The open conclusion is certainly for a sequel with the character Archer. My vote is six.

Title (Brazil): Not Available

Purely based on the entertainment, the acting and the filming The Rezort doesn't deserve more then a five star rating. Maybe a bit more if you base it just on his genre. And by that I mean for a zombie movie it's okay. I saw way worse zombie movies but also much better. In this one the variant is that people go on a safari on an island to shoot zombies and of course it all goes wrong. A lot of shooting, running and biting, the usual zombie stuff. It is what it is, but if you like that kind of stuff then with this movie it is what you will get. I have kind of an overdose of the zombie genre so maybe I'm a bit biased writing about The Rezort. Anyways, it could have been much worse so I won't complain any further.