The problem with Movie Night is, I'm asked to choose something from the "new selections" on Hulu, Netflix, Amazon Prime, and MAX, with no research, just a cover blurb. Then, if it turns out to be awful, I get blamed: "You picked this!"
Last night I selected The Dead Don't Die on Hulu, because it starred Bill Murry and it was about zombies in a small town. I was wondering if anything new could be said about zombies after so many years of being blasted by Zombie Apocalypses.
No. Other than a few absurdist touches, like characters being aware that they're in a movie and an alien spaceship that appears out of nowhere, picks up Tilda Swinton, and vanishes, it's the standard. Due to..um...fracking?,,, day and night get mixed up, cell phones don't work, and the dead re-animate.
They crawl out of their graves, fully corporeal, even though some have been dead for centuries -- and eat the living in a small Pennsylvania town. Maybe everywhere in the world. The only suspense is wondering who will get eaten next.
This movie needs an editor. Cop #1 enters the diner to look at the two zombie-eaten waitresses. We see one, then the other, with their innards turned into spaghetti. Cop #2 enters to look. We see one, then the other again. Cop #3 enters to look. We see one, then the other a third time!
But on the bright side, there is no hetero-romance, and we see many gay subtexts. Probably unintentional.
The main zombies and zombie-dinners are:
1.-3. Three big city hipsters:Austin Butler, top photo; Luka Sabbat; and Selena Gomez. They stop for gas and for some reason decide to stay overnight in the town's decrepit hotel instead of continuing on to Pittsburgh. Selena flirts with every guy in sight, even when she doesn't want to get something from him, but there's no indication that she's dating either of her companions.
4-7. Police officers Bill Murray and Adam Driver, second photo. Adam asks the female police officer at the station for a date, and Bill had an affair with town drunk Carol Kane. But the two end up together, with a sort of buddy-bonding going on before they are killed.
8-9. Neither racist farmer Steve Buscemi nor cat-loving hotel manager Larry Fessenden, left, have wives at home, mention dead wives, or flirt with the gals at the diner.
10-12. Caleb Landry Jones, who played a gay guy in Stonewall, runs the gas station/horror movie memorabilia shop, seems to have a crush on delivery driver RZA. He almost asks him for a date, but loses his nerve. Later he is trapped in a hardware store with Danny Glover, and almost grabs his hand before they are eaten.
Bonus: Caleb Landry's butt
