World War Z

By Kurt Jensen, Catholic News Service

NEW YORK (CNS) — When the zombies come a-runnin’, as they do throughout “World War Z” (Paramount), the only defences will be guns, knives, duct tape and maybe a vaccine.

That’s all there is to this dreary apocalypse tale, which stars Brad Pitt as United Nations troubleshooter Gerry Lane. As in, there’s trouble, and he shoots.

Brad Pitt, Abigail Hargrove and Mireille Enos star in a scene from the movie “World War Z.” . (CNS photo/Paramount)

Lane, who’s retired from that job, is called back into action by U.N. Undersecretary Thierry Umutoni (Fana Mokoena) because the president of the United States is dead, the vice president is missing, and no one in particular seems to be in charge, so the planet needs an exterminator — right quick.

This loose adaptation of Max Brooks’ novel by director Marc Foster and screenwriters Matthew Michael Carnahan, Drew Goddard and Damon Lindelof respectfully observes all the cliches of the zombie-pandemic genres without much gore, possibly because there are thousands upon thousands of zombies to shoot at, blow up, or hit with flamethrowers.

Lane’s calm morning, as he takes daughters Connie (Sterling Jerins) and Rachel (Abigail Hargrove) to school with wife Karin (Mireille Enos) in Philadelphia, is interrupted with zombies running amok, holding up traffic and wrecking his minivan. He manages to steal another vehicle, and they get as far as Newark to loot a drugstore for Rachel’s asthma medicine. Umutoni is on the phone, demanding that he get to where a helicopter can pick them all up, and soon they’re at sea on an aircraft carrier.

Lane is ordered to find the source of whatever it is that’s creating zombies, which takes him to a military base in South Korea, then to Jerusalem, where a huge wall surrounds the city to keep the undead at bay.

There may be a sublimated political message here about the Palestinians, undocumented immigrants or maybe even the walls of Jericho, but the scenes there move too quickly for obvious subtext. They’re just an excuse to show how zombies can pile up and scale that wall.

Finally, Lane heads to a World Health Organization research lab in Wales. Along the way, he picks up Israeli security guard Segen (Daniella Kertesz), who, like himself, is durable enough to survive the crash of the jumbo passenger jet taking them there.

What pluck! What moxie! And what a time-waster!

The film contains gun and physical violence, zombies biting people, and fleeting crass language. Possibly acceptable for older teens

Amour

By Kurt Jensen, Catholic News Service

NEW YORK (CNS) — If “Amour” (Sony Classics) makes you want to check in on your parents or grandparents, it’s done its job. Late plot developments, however, make this a film even mature viewers will need to approach with caution and prudence.

Jean-Louis Trintignant and Emmanuelle Riva star in a scene from the movie “Amour.” (CNS photo/Sony Pictures Classics)

The French-language drama is meant to provoke discussion and to be disturbing, despite its generally sensitive portrayal of enduring love expressed by an elderly couple. Nothing about either aging or debilitating infirmity is sanitized or whisked away.

Georges (Jean-Louis Trintignant) and Anne (Emmanuelle Riva) are retired music teachers, both in their 80s, living in Paris. A series of strokes causes Anne to lose control of her right side, then renders her incontinent, then robs her of speech. After that, she begins to refuse nourishment.

Everything takes place in their apartment because after her first hospital visit, Anne made Georges promise not to put her there again, and he tries to get by with home nurses. Confronted by their daughter, Eva (Isabelle Huppert), about why he doesn’t consider a hospice, Georges replies, “What they do there, we can do here. I promised her that.”

But at what price to his own sanity? The film’s stately pacing doesn’t conceal the damage to either husband or wife.

Writer-director Michael Haneke doesn’t make subtle movies. He directs raw, unbending statements on moral behaviour, as he did in his last film, “The White Ribbon” (2009), which showed the roots of Nazi cruelty in Germany.

The act-of-madness resolution in “Amour” does not comport with Catholic teaching — far from it, in fact. But the objectively sinful behavior portrayed takes place in the context of increasing desperation. Unsupported by the comforting milieu of a hospice and devoid of faith, the character involved is overwhelmed.

In “The White Ribbon,” Haneke was quite cruel toward German Lutheranism, portraying it strictly as a form of oppression. So the absence of religion here may not be altogether a negative development.

Death and dying are experiences focused on by all faiths, but rarely addressed — at least honestly — in film. Well-grounded audience members can interpret the film using their own prisms of faith, as well as their own experiences with the grim subject matter.

The film contains mature themes and objectively immoral actions, fleeting upper female nudity, a single use of profanity and an instance of rough language.