The Vanguard (2008)

just watch it!

if their story seems completely bonkers, almost like a feverish work of fiction, you ain't heard nothing yet.

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

A film of deceptively outspoken contemporary relevance, this is cinema at its most alert, alarming and alive.

This movie made me think about Sam Raimi's "The Evil Dead", because of its low low low budget, its cheap cheap cheap special effects and its cool cool cool hero. The story sucks, but those things made "The Evil Dead" a classic. Same thing with "The Vanguard", in my opinion. I am a HUGE zombies film fan. When you see the cover, you go "F*, this must be good!". Well, not THAT much... The idea is good; it's like "28 days later" meets "I am legend". The beginning of the movie is really cool, keeps you waiting for more, a really psychological zombie movie... But then, from the middle to the end, the director and his story (and the actors) just go nowhere... I actually SLEPT for a few minutes during the last 15 last minutes of the movie, nothing happened... Me, sleeping during a zombie movie, NOT A GOOD SIGN!!! Things that are worthy in this movie: 1) Max, the hero. What a cool character! 2) The beginning of the movie, a diary-like script. 3) The ending (the last 10 or 15 seconds). Watch it and have your own opinion, it's not a waste of time, believe me.

So much pro's and much more contra's. I can understand why, it starts nicely with some kind of zombies attacking a person. It is really gory in some ways and the use of colors in post production via color grading made it a bit arty. It reminded me a bit of Walhalla Rising. There is even not that much spoken words but then the movie suddenly turns into a battle flick. It is somewhere between Resident Evil and I Am Legend and so much more so yes, we have seen it all before but the problem I had is that it as I said suddenly changed from gory zombie fights into normal fights. And the last part takes too much i this flick so it's more science fiction than horror. It do has his moments but somehow it couldn't really convince me.

This Movie Was Bad Hilariously Bad' It Made You Think Something Good Was Going To Happen Only To Leave You Confused And Bewildered In The End. The Main Character Just Spends The Hold Time Running Through The Woods And Killing Off Zombie Ape Like People With Axes' He's Supposedly Deaf But Somewhere Along The Way He All a Of Sudden Starts To Talk And Act as If He Can Hear. This Is Where Everything Gets Ridiculously Bad' All The Time You're Waiting For This Thing To Come To The Plot' Cause All Movies Have Plots Right? Right?? Not This One All You Get Is a Bunch Of Running Shooting Narrative Talking And An Ending So Stupid And Ridiculous It Just Leaves You Staring Blankly At The Screen. My Suggestion Is Do Not Watch This Unless You Have 98.Minutes To Kill' If Not Please Pass This Up And Go Watch 28 Days Later Or Some Of The Much Better Made Apocalypse Zombie Films. It's Obvious Whoever Made This Was Just Trying To Kill Some Time As Well.

Well if there is one genre done to death (no pun intended) it is the zombie movie. We have the holy war still waging between fast and slow zombies. We have zombies that talk, act like normal people, shuffle, learn how to do various things (whatever the plot needs), evolve, and some attempts to make them cute. Besides the vampire there is no other great cliché movie. Having said this, every once in a while you see a film take the genre in a way you didn't imagine. The Vanguard is one of those very rare and dying breed. This film takes place in the UK and is after the world has ended. Civilization is represented by the evil Corporation (we never learn it's name) and the barbarians are represented by the Biosyns. They like the zombies in 28 Days Later are fueled by rage but unlike 28 Days they are evolving. The main character is Max and his story takes you on a very strange but also incredibly enjoyable ride with an ending that you probably won't see coming but will be impressed with none the less. A worthy addition to my horror collection and well worth you time to check it out.