Do you consider yourself one of those people who are constantly craving mindless zombie movies that are fun and filled with action and nothing else? Then Joey De Guzman and Ays De Guzman (director and writer) have just the movie for you with Day Zero. It is a mindless zombie flick that boasts some gruesome kills, a ton of fun, and zombie filled mayhem and that is about it. It doesn’t reinvent the genre, doesn’t bring anything new to the genre, and doesn’t try to say anything, instead it just focuses on zombies and kills which for 82 minutes is all it needs to do to be entertaining.
The movie focuses on former UFC fighter, Brandon Vera playing Emon as he in prison for defending a friend. The issue is because hes a former UFC fighter, him defending his friend landed him in prison for accidentally crippling the person. While he’s in prison, he finds himself between a rock and a hard place again, defending his friend Timoy played by Pepe Herrera. On the outside though he has a wife, Sheryl played by Mary Jean Lastimosa and a daughter, Jane, played by Freya Fury Montierro. While on the inside, he’s granted parole, then loses it for defending Timoy from the prison gang. However, everyone from the prison is released as a zombie outbreak has been declared and Emon must find his way back home to reunite with his family as the chaos breaks out.
Ays De Guzman tries to make a compelling script filled with heart, but ultimately fails to do so but that is not entirely his fault. As a former UFC fighter, Brandon Vera is cast simply for his brutality and his ability to pull off some moves. He is not there for his acting ability or performance and the script then falls to the bayside. However, when you have a human beast like Vera, I wish the script had some more gnarly and ridiculous kills to it. Sure there were a few kills that certainly created an uproar of excitement, but too many of them were simple gun shots and uncreative weapon related kills. Audiences can see basic kills anywhere, they’re always fun, but give me someone taking some barbed wire around their hand and ripping someone’s heart out or slowly decapitating them trying not to be bit any day.
While Pepe Herrera, Mary Jean Jean Lastimosa and Freya Fury Montierro all give all, Day Zero certainly isn’t focused on performance but rather the brutality as previously mentioned. The script leans into that a bit, but again needs to be further explored into the brutality. However it is the direction by Joey De Guzman that takes the action packed slower paced zombie flick, focuses on the action set pieces and the powerhouse that is Brandon Vera to pack the punch it needs for the zombie crowd to be pleasantly amused by the sheer undead chaos that unfolds on screen.
