Average
Summary
Day Zero doesn’t really stand out in the over saturated zombie genre but I do like Brandon Vera destroying “infected” in imaginative ways and it makes for a quick 80 minute bloodbath.
Plot: When society breaks down due to a violent outbreak that turns victims into undead monsters, a former elite soldier breaks out of jail to find his family.
Review: I can take or leave the zombie film genre as there is very little we haven’t seen before by now however, Day Zero is a fun one with Brandon Vera punching, shooting, kicking and stabbing his way through hordes of infected (or zombies but no one seems to use that term anymore, for some reason).
At 80 minutes long it wastes no time getting going but still manages to pack in some characterization where Emon (Vera) is about to get out of prison on parole to be with his wife and daughter.
Before he is released, he ends up getting into a fight trying to protect his friend Timoy (Pepe Herrera) and the warden says he is no longer granted his freedom. Fate has other plans as a new plague has taken over the world and turned the infected into bloodthirsty monsters. Emon and Timoy escape and try to find Emon’s family before they are lost forever.
What ensues is absolute carnage with some bloody kills and a huge bodycount. Vera is huge and I love watching him throwing zombies around like they are ragdolls and he’s believably fierce in any confrontations. Timoy could have ended up being the annoying sidekick character but I liked what they did with him making him a selfless hero. Vera doesn’t display much in the way of emotion but he doesn’t need to; he’s just a force to be reckoned with who will stop at nothing to save his family and the does it well.
There isn’t much else to it other than people trying to not get killed but the effects are decent considering the modest budget and it’s well paced. We rarely get fistfights in zombie movies, so that’s arguably the biggest highlight of Day Zero.
Overall, Day Zero is hardly groundbreaking but it’s a fun zombie flick with some entertaining kills and a quick pace making it an easy watch.