If a virus had wiped out almost everyone in the world, turning them into flesh-eating zombies, and it was night-time, and all electricity was out so you couldn’t see a thing, and you heard a suspicious noise outside your house, what would you do: a) stay in the safety of your house, or b) grab a miniature torch and go out into the pitch-black night, unarmed, wading into a nearby river to see what’s out there? If you answered b) you are like the chumps in this film. There’s no dramatic tension, because the characters make such baffling decisions that it’s difficult to root for them.
Full disclosure: I have not seen the original film The Zombie Diaries, so I can’t comment on how this sequel stands up to it. But I can say that knowledge of the first instalment is unnecessary when watching this one – the ‘zombie apocalpyse’ theme will be familiar to everyone by now, so when we’re thrown head first into the hand-held action of the opening scene, it’s easy to work out what’s going on.
Yes, it’s another amateur camcorder-style zombie flick, this time set largely in a military outpost in Hertfordshire. Cue lots of talking directly to camera (“we are the last people left, so we decided to document it” etc) and violently shaking visuals as the survivors flee the undead. Since it spends so much time drawing attention to its form – again, something that even casual horror viewers are likely to be overfamiliar with – World Of The Dead gets to be a bit of a slog rather quickly. Die-hard fans of the genre will likely find things to enjoy, but if you’re after a good scare, best look elsewhere.
Special features include a surprisingly lengthy (25 minutes) and detailed making-of doc, giving you as much information as you could possibly need or want about how and why The Zombie Diaries 2 exists.
Overall Verdict: It doesn’t bring anything new to the table, but of its type – hand-held zombie horror – it’s reasonable entertainment if you’re into that sort of thing.
Special Features:
Making-of documentary
Directors’ commentary
Reviewer: Tom René