When is a Zombie not a Zombie…when it’s in World War Z.

When I was a teenager my list of most frightening monsters started with werewolves, progressed down to vampires then crazy gigantic insects, zombies, with their lack of intelligence and slower than molasses movements, never struck me as practically frightening. Sure they looked gross but all you had to do was walk away, seriously zombies are that slow.

  

Then I saw World War Z’s take on zombies and wow that’s scary the first ten minutes had me at the edge of my seat but you know what even more surprising, this really isn't a zombie movie. There are no supernatural incarnations, no magical items that makes the zombies, no voodoo high priest directing the calamity.

In this case it is a very virulent virus that causes the symptoms and the overall plot is about the UN trying to find a cure. Of course the Z word comes into play because of the way the virus is spread and the way it attacks the body.

  

The difference in this movie to the other zombie movies I've watch and they are not many, my son is the real zombie aficionado of the family, is the way the zombies move. The virus seems to change humans from individuals into a hive like mentality, where the whole unit will react to stimulus supplied to just one of the infected, that and of course, how fast they react. Start training now if you ever hope to outrun these zombies.

Accepting this story line the movie plays out as a detective movie as Brad Pitt investigates the origins of the virus, the information which the UN doctors seem to feel will allow them to develop a vaccine, within the chaos created by the virus.

  

Director Marc Forster creates a thrilling and chilling 116 minute story that garbs the viewer from the start and does not let him go until the credits start to run. The characters introduced are all believable everyday people, no Winchester brothers here, reacting to events as they play out, which is what ends up making it that scarier.

This movie works on both levels, as a horror Zombie flick, though lacking all the gore and blood usually associated with zombie tales but the action and suspense more than makes up for this and also as a medical action/drama pretty much like 2011’s Contagion and 1995’s Outbreak.

World War Z is definitely a movie to watch.