djsiyer

This Spanish film, based on a book, focuses on one survivor's efforts to join his sister and her family who have fled the zombie apocalypse. I was impressed at how resourceful he is, repeatedly coming up with clever ideas to solve problems, starting with the diving gear and ending with an ingenious method of getting safely past a large number of zombies. As is usual in this genre, he has to avoid both the flesh eaters and dangerous human survivors, but unlike many other zombie films, there is no gratuitous violence. Indeed, the death count is relatively low (for the genre), but this doesn't compromise the action or the tension. I also liked his commitment to his cat. There may be a subtle political message in the film, which is not surprising, given when it was made. I don't normally watch zombie films which are not set in America, but I'm glad I watched this one, and I'd give it a 7 out of 10.

This is a low-budget action film made in Bulgaria with Antonio Bandares. The plot is simple and there are no or few surprises, but it's well-scripted, acted, edited and shot. For a film that's almost all set in a shopping mall, it's surprisingly good. Kingsley looks pretty good for an actor in his 70s and some of the fight scenes are very well choreographed. My only gripe is that some of the other characters could have been slightly more developed, but I guess in a movie that's this short, that wasn't possible.

This gender reversal remake of the excellent Dirty Rotten Scoundrels is not just disappointing but embarrassing, in its poor script and bad acting. You can see all the "jokes" (and the word is used loosely as we didn't laugh even once during the film) a mile away, they usually involve the chubby Rebel Wilson waddling around and saying something completely unbelievable loudly, and some overacting male mark implausibly falling for it. Even the Anne Hathaway scams are pretty stupid. The effect is that the viewer is left squirming at the unfunnyness of it all. Wilson and Hathaway don't come close to emulating Steve Martin and Michael Caine, whose acting had us in stitches in the classic this is based on. Do yourself a favour and don't waste your time watching this rubbish.