I Love Sarah Jane (2008)

Good concept, poorly executed.

A terrific literary drama and character piece that shows how the process of creating art can be seen differently by those doing it and those looking at it from the outside.

Just intense enough to provide a much-needed diversion, just lightweight enough to make you forget about it soon after it’s over. It’s not exactly “good,” per se, but it does what it sets out to do in terms of putting us on edge, which makes it … successful?

All of these films share one commonality, that being a kind of emotional center that humanizes a cast of monsters.

This short film is well known, doing very well in festivals and online – not at all hurt by the presence of Mia Wasikowska in the title role (who at the same time was being amazing in season 1 of HBO's In Treatment). The plot sees a handful of younger children and teens, who are alone in a zombie wasteland. Some of them are tormenting a zombie restrained outside, but for one of the boys his focus is on his crush for the older Sarah Jane.There is a nice idea here – or rather a series of nice ideas. The coming-of-age sort of element, with a delicate and shy crush on an older girl, playing out in such an aggressive environment; the plot development of the ending; the Lord of the Flies element of chaos and lack of restriction on those of an age who need restrictions the most. I wanted it to be stronger than it was because of all these things. Unfortunately it doesn't quite make the first half work as well as it needed to. The second half is stronger, with some brutal and heart- felt elements, but unfortunately these have the side- effect of making the first half feel disconnected from the rest – and the crush and the 'main' character suddenly seems less important and interesting.Wasikowska sells it, and stands out. The rest of the cast are not so convincing in themselves; although the special effects are much more convincing and engagingly done. There are good elements here, and it is worth seeing, but it doesn't totally make use of its good ideas, even if the ending is quite strong.

I remember seeing this film back in 2008 around the time when it came out. I really liked it back then. Mostly because it's very minimalistic style. And I hugely liked Zombie movies (I still do, but not the modern fast zombies), so I had a chance to revisit the old memories. Zombie films were already overdone in 2008 and now the genre is finally out of juice. 'I Love Sarah Jane' somehow remains one of the few good modern zombie films, although the zombie apocalypse isn't in the main focus (probably because of the low budged). This film rather tells us story about orphaned kids and of course the first real love. And it is very hard not to love Sarah Jane (Mia Wasikowska) who looks strong, but is vulnerable inside, and can be pretty cruel if needed. If you are able to look pass at some minor flaws (the CGI special effects are not quite top notch), it is quite enjoyable short film from already tired zombie genre.

I Love Sarah Jane (2008)** 1/2 (out of 4) Nice short film from Australia about a small group of kids living in a post apocalyptic world where one of them wants to be with the lovely Sarah Jane. While his buddies stay outside torturing a zombie, he'd much rather be inside with her. There's not too much to this short but for what it is it remains mildly entertaining from start to finish. I liked the idea of having a group of kids being the last people on Earth and I think the film benefits from having a rather fun way of them picking on a zombie like we'd normally just see them picking on a dorky kid. The zombie is tied up and can't defend itself so we see them slapping him around and even taking a weed eater to its face. The movie is well directed and the kid performances aren't too bad. We get some mild gore for horror fans as well as a nasty kill.

This short film is like THE LORD OF THE FLIES meets OMEGA MAN....with lots and lots and lots of cussing. The film begins with a 13 year-old kid on a bicycle riding through a town where the homes are mostly destroyed, bodies lie in the road torn apart and burned out hulks of cars are strewn about the road. Some sort of apocalyptic event has obviously occurred and soon you see that a zombie plague has destroyed society--leaving some kids but no adults. And, like THE LORD OF THE FLIES, the kids mostly do nothing productive. One loathsome teen spends his time torturing a zombie who is chained up and the rest just stand back and watch. However, the boy at the beginning of the film goes in the house and tries to strike up a conversation with a young lady. After an awkward attempt at conversation, the two go outside to see the bully blowing up the zombie--but, of course, this backfires and results in a rather grisly ending.While there are lots of cool elements to the film and it sure could have been great, the overall production had me feeling like the whole thing was a definite miss. Despite great zombie special effects and some interesting plot elements, seeing nasty teens curse non-stop like drunken sailors isn't my idea of entertainment. Sure, in such an awful world, it would be understandable to have some cursing (heck, if I saw a zombie I'd surely let out an amazing torrent of epithets)--but to have practically every other word be "f-this" and "f-that" gets very old and shows a lack of discipline or respect for the audience (unless you only want to appeal to a minority of the viewers). Why in recent years independent film makers feel that dialog like this is "edgy" or "hip" is beyond me--it just shows a lack of imagination. And this is a terrible shame, because it's obvious there were some great ideas and execution in this film. Clearly an opportunity lost for greatness.