"Zombieland"

Occasionally I contribute movie reviews, among other articles, to the Arkansas Times, the AAN weekly here in Little Rock. Because the generally haphazard nature of the venture and the inconsequential size of this media market, I'm often a week behind, forking out a high-single-digit ransom to see the likes of "Slumdog Millionaire" or "Religulous" or "Vicky Christina Barcelona" or “The Informant!” and then pounding out 400 to 500 words on whether the movie is worth your money and time. Often as not, it is: Met on their own terms, most major releases tend to hit the same comfortable middle ground that most consumer goods do - similar, say, to a restaurant meal.

This week I reviewed “Zombieland,” which was unusual for a couple of reasons. First, I was able to see it Monday night at a promotional screening here in Little Rock, something apparently arranged by a radio station. Knowing that the theater would be lousy with people who’d gotten free tickets, I tried arriving almost 20 minutes early. But when my friend Kyle and I pulled into the cinema parking lot, we saw no more than a dozen cars. “This doesn’t look like free anything,” I told him. Sheepishly I phoned my editor, who informed me that I had the wrong theater. We jumped back in the car and drove at the sort of clip that inspired Kyle to reminisce about curb-hopping, parking lot-cutting races across his college town when he was a student. We arrived at the movie after the title credits, to a packed house. Funny thing: For a fat, shiny gumball like “Zombieland,” you wouldn’t want it any other way. Woody Harrelson’s character, Tallahassee, has an ongoing jones for Twinkies (ironic, maybe, given Harrelson’s own raw food diet; explaining this to "Esquire" he said, “To eat only raw food, you've got to love a salad. You've got to just love a salad."). A little girl (6 or 7 years old) sitting next to me kept asking her mom, “What’s a Twinkie?” Sitting a couple of seats away, the girl’s dad, I presume, threw in a couple of wisecracks, calling the protagonist (whom I described as a “a germaphobic ‘World of Warcraft’-addicted wiener") a “sissy” when he snuggled with a girl on a couch, and remarked, when a Humvee makes a timely appearance, that “every man needs a Hummer,” perhaps lowercased. A friend told us afterwards that the father next to her spent time scrounging the theater floor for an errant Adderall while his child bounced and chirped for all to behold.

But “Zombieland” wasn’t exactly “The Pianist,” and a little rowdiness doesn’t hurt. Yelling at the screen during a horror/action/comedy is no more disruptive than dancing at a concert. Which goes to the other unusual aspect of the “Zombieland” review: I didn’t say it explicitly, but that movie is pretty damn funny. Harrelson is the sort of knowing stupid-funny that makes me want to invite him over for a salad. On the way home I realized my abs felt like I'd been doing crunches; that's laughter, kids, and it's as healthy as fresh air. I stand by the closing of the piece: “You'll maximize your entertainment buck by seeing it with the largest, loudest, drunkest, dumbest audience you can find.” Sooner, then, is better.