Wednesday, September 28, 2016

3 Short Paragraphs: Burying the Ex

2014, Joe Dante (The Howling, Small Soldiers) -- Netflix

What movies has Joe Dante done again? I dunno; sucky ones? He's a familiar name but not one associated with quality. And along comes a low key, not very ambitious zombie rom com (that is not very funny) starring the late Anton Yelchin (bye bye Chekov) and Ashley Green, the girl from Twilight who is now relegated to click baits at the bottom of pop culture blogs ("Why Doesn't Hollywood Cast Ashley Greene Anymore?").  Oh, and my favourite blue eyes -- Alexandra Daddario.

Yelchin is a nice guy dating a not so nice girl. She is the classic depiction of how we hate green bloggers, our collective dismissal of people who care about the Environment while not giving a shit about their relationships. She's gorgeous and looks good on paper, but she's manipulative. And then she gets hit by a bus; literally. But Yelchin works in a LA horror shop and one the shipments contained an evil genie thing, so his GF rises from the dead, to continue their "perfect" relationship. Meanwhile, during the mourning period, Yelchin fell for the ice cream ("i scream") girl of his dreams; someone who was not only stunningly beautiful but someone he had a lot in common with. Two girls at the same time but one is dead?  Instant hah hah! Then how come the movie is not really all that funny?

The thing is I liked it. It is a weird, confused little movie more tragedy than laughs but it had charm. Yelchin and Daddario really do exude chemistry, and I have a fondness for movies that spotlight a particular lifestyle. These are horror kids, the kinds who go to rep theatres to watch classic black & white monster movies, who have posters and toys all over their place, who still collect VHS tapes because many movies have not been reissued. They live in a small section of LA, probably near old Hollywood, and the movie lets you get the idea of what it is like to live there. And they also reflect the audience who watch this kind of of movie. And I guess it takes these kind of kids to accept a zombie ex-GF (well not accept accept, but not entirely freak out) and properly process the breakup.

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