The Dead Don’t Die

The “Scary Movie” franchise does such an effective job of mocking horror movie conventions, it’s hard to watch “The Dead Don’t Die” (2019) and feel like you haven’t heard these jokes before, because in some cases, you have. Adam Driver and Bill Murray are small-town cops confronted with a slow-motion zombie apocalypse. That’s because zombies walk slow (which is the kind of gag you might see in this movie) but also because the story kind of drags, like a corpse’s partially severed limb. It’s very close to being hilarious (especially Tilda Swinton’s scenes), but ends up too clever by half.

Shaun of the Dead

I’m not a big fan of zombie movies, but if I had to recommend one, it would be “Shaun of the Dead” (2004). I mean, it figured out a way to combine a bro-com, a rom-com and a zombie movie in one package. Simon Pegg deserves some kind of credit for that. This is his first of three offbeat comedies in which he teams with co-writer/director Edgar Wright and co-star Nick Frost (“Hot Fuzz” and “The World’s End” are the others). They’ve attained somewhat of a cult classic status – this one moreso than the other two. All are worth watching.