Handling the Undead

Somehow they manged to take the original story and remove most of the interesting parts, leaving us with a slow and atmospheric exposé of loss and grief. What it does it does great, it's beautifully filmed and the acting is good, but it's just not enough. The entire point of having the dead come back to life is to examine all the implications of this happening, the original story understands this, it's in the title "Handling the undead", it asks the question of how to deal with this situation. But here most of those implications are glanced over or not touched upon at all, making the supernatural elements superfluous. Ultimately this movie had worked much better if it was just a story about three families experiencing loss, maybe in some kind of sliding doors scenario. It unfortunately feels like a missed opportunity and a waste of good source material.

First of all, I love what John Ajvide Lindqvist does. I read almost all of his books and every time it was a pure pleasure. However, he's very, very, extremely unlucky with the movie adaptations of his books. This particular movie... I don't know what it is and why it was made. For those who read the book it will be a torture, for those who didn't - just a dead-boring piece of crap.

Also, I don't think anyone in the team had any idea of what they were doing. The meaning of the book was completely different, and I mean 100% different. Why is there the Satanic cross on the poster? What Satan has to do with this movie and with this book?

Your potential movie-watcher is likely to arrive at this expecting something different than it is; billed as a 'zombie horror' and written by John Ajvide Lindquist (it was his follow up novel to Let The Right One In). This is something quite different however.

A bit more light is shed by being aware that this is Norway's entry to the Oscar for the Best International Film. Rather, it is a fairly slow-moving and tragic drama, though it does involve the dead reawakening. The measured pace is symbolic of the mood of the characters as they grieve. The film is, in effect, a triptych, concerning three families who have just lost loved ones. The cinematography is the highlight, and it is a fine achievement and a first break through feature for its director, Thea Hvistendahl.

Its IMDb score is understandable as so many will stumble on this expecting something quite different; zombie films have jump scares and often dark humour, this is meditative and thought provoking, though it would have benefitted from a few lighter moments.

In an already tired genre, Handling the Undead aims for a more contemplative and somber face than what we're used to with said genre. The standouts here being the music and atmosphere, one must think such a devotion to visuals would garner strong staying power, yet such was not the case. It's grief observed, through the lens of dark corridors and isolated pastures, asking the singular question, "if you had one more chance to talk to your loved one, what would you say?". Throughout the runtime I discovered the film wasn't exactly interested in exploring this question through a vessel or character of sorts, as it's practically nonexistent. In the end I was left starved, yearning for a connection. A film with a pulse that slowly fades into obscurity.

Eerie and somber example of Scandinavian elevated horror, that adapts a novel by the author of "Let the Right One In" and marks Thea Hvistendahl's debut as a feature film director. The movie offers a unique take on zombies, focusing more on grief and the human connection between the living and the undead rather than the familiar horror evoked by these creatures. Unfortunately, it moves at an excessively slow and contemplative pace, and eventually becomes exhausting in its tedium. To make matters worse, when events unfold exactly as expected, they do so without scares or surprises, failing to generate any genuine horror. The one highlight is the beautiful and melancholic score by composer Peter Raeburn, which lingers even after the film ends.