Welcome, one and all, to the Reaction & Review "Christmas in July Special". Yes, guys, I decided that I'm gonna be doing another one of these Christmas specials in July, what with it being a holiday and all. And I've found a rather unique movie to cover for this special. It is a British zombie musical from 2017. That movie is "Anna and the Apocalypse".
No, guys, I am not kidding. This movie is literally a zombie musical. I, myself, was kinda surprised by this a little after I discovered it at one of my local video stores last year. And I had originally thought about covering this movie for my "Christmas Special" last year, but I instead chose to do "Bad Santa". And seeing as how I already have my other "Christmas Special" locked in for this year, I decided to cover this movie for my "Christmas in July Special" instead.
Now, when I originally discovered this movie, I had no idea it was going to be a zombie musical. I looked at the cover, read the back of the DVD case, and I thought it was going to be some standard zombie movie. So I was curious and decided to look it up before I bought it. And the first thing the results showed was that it was being advertised as a zombie musical. And that alone peeked my interest, because I don't think I ever came across a zombie musical before. I mean, the closest I ever came to that was when I watched "Dead & Breakfast", but it wasn't entirely a musical. This movie, however, looks to be heading in that direction, and I'm not totally sure if it's gonna be a good thing or not.
Now, mind you, I am still looking forward to watching this thing. I just don't know if the songs are gonna be any good or not. I haven't seen any clips from this movie, so I'm gonna head into this thing completely blind. And the only way I'm gonna find out if the songs in this thing are any good, as well as the actual movie itself, is if I shut up, and I push play, and I'm gonna do that right now. So, without further ado, it's time to kick back, relax, and check out "Anna and the Apocalypse".
8 minutes later
So, guys, we're up to our first song here, and...it kinda sucks. I think it's partially because the singing isn't that great. Well, at least from Anna it's not great. I'm certainly hoping for her singing to get better though. Because hey, it's only the first song. So maybe her singing will get better as the movie goes along.
8 minutes later
You know, guys, I am willing to grant that this song here is pretty good. It's just that, unfortunately, it's sorta reminding me of something that I would hear in the "High School Musical" movies. That's a rather bad sign when a song like this is reminding you of shit that you would hear from a "High School Musical" movie. Mind you, it's not a real negative against the movie, but it is something that I felt needed to be addressed.
14 minutes later
O...K. Well, that's certainly a creative way to take off a zombie's head. Never thought a see-saw would do the trick, but hey, it certainly worked. And it was pretty cool, too.
9 minutes later
All right, you know what? That kill would've been really cool, if the editing during that sequence wasn't so poor. Seriously, guys, that scene was just terribly edited.
11 minutes later
OK, this guy's high notes are REALLY fucking terrible. I know you guys can't hear this for obvious reasons, but every time this guy attempts to sing a high note, it sounds really fucking bad. And it's sorta ruining a pretty decent song here, too. Just thought I'd let you guys know.
15 minutes later
You know, guys, it's kinda funny. The best and worst song in this movie is sung by our villain. I know that it sounds like it doesn't make any sense, but I'll explain my point when I eventually review this thing.
13 minutes later
Well, guys, I believe I have some good news for once. We actually have a rather good song here. It's kind of a pity that it took this long to finally find a decent song out of this entire musical. But hey, it's better late than ever, right?
The Review
Well, guys, that was "Anna and the Apocalypse". And we end the movie with some rather cute ending credits...interesting. Let's just shut that off...OK. Well, um...I'm gonna say this right now. I am really disappointed with this movie. I really thought that this being a zombie musical would make this movie more interesting, but...it really isn't.
Well, seeing as how this movie was advertised as a musical, I may as well just start with the music. When I heard that this movie was going to be a zombie musical, I really thought that it was going take that concept and turn it into something interesting and cool. And I know that music is very preferential to a lot of people. But I'm gonna tell you, guys, for me, out of every song in this movie, there's only one good song that I actually kinda liked. And it was the last song that was sung by Anna and Savage. The only downside to this is that the song is very short and only lasts about a minute. And I would've counted the other song that featured Nick and his buddies, when Anna and her friends first encounter them, but that gets kneecapped by the fact that Nick's high pitched singing, at certain points, is fucking garbage. To a point where it actually kinda ruined the song for me. The only other song I can make mention of is the one sung solely by our villain Savage. And I said that it was the best and worst out of this entire movie. Well, the reason why I said that is because the song he sings actually does have some energy to it. The problem, though, is that his singing does not match the style of the song itself. And that, to me, is why I considered it to be the best and worst song at the time. Well, the best song, as I just stated, was the very last song of the movie. The worst song would probably have to be this one rap number that a couple of guys in penguin suits were dancing too. Not totally sure if they were singing it or not, but, either way, the song was fucking terrible. In fact, I will even go so far as to say that almost none of these songs have any real energy to them. No song here is going to stick out at you as being completely memorable. Which is pretty sad to say, because you want to have songs that are going to catch the viewers interest, especially if you're doing a musical. And as much as I didn't care about "Raggedy Ann & Andy: A Musical Adventure", at least there, there were at least 2 or 3 songs that were sorta catchy. The problem with that movie was that there were too many songs that brought the story down to a screeching halt. This movie, however, only has one good song, and it doesn't last very long at all. In fact, by the time that I upload this review, I'm not gonna remember ANY of the songs from this movie, because they're just so fucking forgetful. That is actually really depressing, because musicals would normally have a song here or there that would be catchy and memorable, but...no. Not this movie. This movie has some of the most forgettable songs in any musical that I've ever watched! That's not something I say very often about musicals, but this movie has certainly accomplished that feat.
Now, setting aside the music and the songs, the writing itself is a very standard, by the numbers, zombie movie. Nothing about this plot is anything new or different. And for some people that are into zombie films, they're not gonna mind that. Because I know a lot of people that are into zombie flicks. But you see, guys, the reason why I was interested in checking out this movie was for the songs. And with how that ended up turning out, it actually takes a standard zombie movie like this and makes it into a really bland, uninspired movie. Where it does nothing new with the zombie mythos, and it does the same boring shit that we've seen in plenty of zombie movies. I'm gonna tell you guys something. One of the reasons why I loved "Dead & Breakfast" so much was the fact that it didn't do the same bullshit that we've seen in other zombie flicks. It actually did something different where it didn't follow the same stereotypical route in how zombies function. Without going too much into it, because you can go read my full review for that movie somewhere in my R&R file, one of our main characters had a wooden box, and they put bodies parts into it, thus turning them into controlled zombies. THAT was a creative take on the zombie mythos. This movie is doing nothing like that. It takes the very standard route of if you get bitten by a zombie, then it's pretty much game over for you. And I would probably not mind any of that, if the characters were, in any way, memorable. Which they aren't. All of our characters are completely shallow and devoid of personality. Anna wants to go to Australia so that she can get away from her controlling father. John is her best friend. Nick is, or was, her boyfriend. It's a little complicated story there. We have this blonde chick named Steph, who ends up either getting dropped off or abandoned by her parents so that they could take off for Mexico. Again, it's a bit of a weird story there. And Savage is, I guess, sort of a nutcase because he really wants to be the head of this high school that Anna and her friends go to. And honestly, he was the only character that had some level of charm. But, then again, that's not saying very much, because nutcases don't really have much depth to begin with. And then there's Anna's father, who Anna and her friends try to get to, so that way they can escape with as many survivors as they can. I'm tempted to spoil this, but I'm not going to, on the off chance that you want to go and see this movie for yourself. But the way that they handle this twist about Anna's father ends up becoming rather stupid. And I didn't give a fuck about it when it was revealed. In fact, I didn't care about any of these characters, because, as I just stated, they don't really have any depth or personality to them. And by the time that some of these characters end up being bitten by the zombies, I didn't feel a thing for any of them. And that's usually a rather bad sign when a zombie movie fails to make you care about characters that you're suppose to get behind.
So yeah, the writing in this movie is just the same boring shit that we've seen in plenty of other zombie films. The only thing that is different is that this is a musical. But with the songs that they have here, almost all of them end up being completely forgettable. I could also see this movie trying to aim for humor, but it doesn't really work at all. One bit I can remember is when two of our male characters are riffing on famous celebrities that may or may not have gotten bitten by zombies. One of them they mention is Justin Bieber. Funny, because I could've sworn that by 2014 or 2015, people stopped giving a shit about Justin Bieber all together. They also mention Robert Downey Jr. as Iron Man and Taylor Swift. Which tells me either they were desperate for relevant celebrities at the time, or they were trying to be as hipster as possible. I don't know, and I particularly don't care. Point is, the humor is most definitely a misfire here. And any other bits that I could mention are just as forgettable as the songs in this movie. And I'll try to stop talking about the forgettable songs, because I've said plenty about that as is. As for the acting, well, you know what? Even though some of the singing from these actors wasn't that great, the acting is actually pretty good. As far as I could tell, nobody here really phoned it in, and I couldn't really spot a bad actor that wasn't really trying. And that's something I can definitely give the actors in this movie for. The acting is certainly on point, especially when they were given this kind of script. So, you know what? Props to all of the actors for giving it their all for this movie. You guys certainly did a pretty good job with what you were given to do for this movie.
I will also say that the special effects in this thing are really good. I have no idea what the budget is on this thing, because I couldn't find any information on the film's budget, but I'm going to take a guess here and say that it was filmed on a pretty low budget. And for what it is, the special effects looked pretty good. The zombie makeup is rather good. Blood and gore effects are also done very well. I couldn't really tell if there was any CG involved in this film. And I say that, mainly for the questionable blood in, like, one or two shots. But if there were any, then those shots looked OK for what it is. Our sets here are pretty good, too. So overall, the special effects are pretty good for a low budget film.
Camerawork here is really good, however, there is a scene involving editing that I need to talk about. And I just noticed this, but this is the third straight film in a row that I have to bring up the editing. I did NOT plan that when I was typing these reviews, but here we are. Anyway, there's a scene in this movie that was not edited very well. I brought this up earlier, but it bears repeating. There's a scene in this movie where one of the kills takes place at a bowling alley. One of our zombies is stalking, I think, John (not totally sure if it was him or not), and Steph ends up rolling a bowling ball at the zombie's feet, knocking it to the ground. Now, here's where the editing comes into play. You see, after the zombie is knocked off it's feet, it falls to the ground on the bowling lane. And then it gets it's head chopped off by a pinsetter that's used to knock off the bowling pins from their positions. To which it's head gets rolled back to where the bowling balls are brought back to the players. Now, that sounds really creative...except the zombie was nowhere NEAR the position to which the pinsetter was at. Because it was, like, 5 feet away from where the pinsetter was at. I could maybe understand if the zombie was knocked off it's feet to a point where it either rolled to or flew under the pinsetter, but it wasn't. Like I said, the zombie fell straight to the ground after the bowling ball knocked it off it's feet. And it was nowhere near to where the pinsetter was at, as it was coming down for the kill. And it takes a cool scene on paper, to which the editing ruins it because the zombie was nowhere near to where it was suppose to be at. So...yeah, a cool kill was ruined thanks to a bit of shoddy editing. But beyond that, like I said, the camerawork is really good. The lighting is really good. I've already touched upon the music, so there's no need to talk about it again. And the sound-mix is also good. So really, minus the music, the technical stuff works fine.
But unfortunately, the one thing I was really looking forward to in this movie ended up being the weakest part of the entire movie. And on that note, when all is said and done, can I recommend "Anna and the Apocalypse"? Personally, no. Because the songs in this movie were mostly shit. And the fact that this movie is just another been there, done that, zombie apocalypse film. However, there might be those of you who might end up really liking the songs in this movie. So if you're a fan of bullshit like "High School Musical", and you love zombie films, then shit, you're gonna absolutely adore this movie. However, if you have taste in musicals, and you're tired of the same shit you've seen in plenty of other zombie films, then you're gonna want to skip this. This movie does nothing new with it's story or the zombie mythos. And I probably would not have minded that if the songs and the characters were, in any way, interesting. However, that's not the case here. And because of how truly disappointing this movie turned out to be, there is no way in hell I'm gonna be adding this movie to my list of Christmas movies that I want to watch every year during that time. And that's really sad to say, because I wanted to like this movie. I really did. Because the idea of this movie being a zombie musical sounded really cool and really interesting. However...as has been the case with this series, cool ideas don't make for good movies. And this movie is no exception. Now...I'm gonna go watch a good musical. And I've got plenty of choices here. Let's see...I got "Repo! The Genetic Opera", "Rock-A-Doodle", "James and the Giant Peach", "The Brave Little Toaster"...I've got plenty of options, so I'm gonna go pick one of those to watch. Because I need to watch a better musical after dealing with the forgettable bullshit that was in this movie.
Anyway, guys, we come to the close of this year's "Christmas in July Special" for Reaction & Review. Well...that certainly ruined my Christmas spirit. I'm hoping for my actual "Christmas Special" to turn out better, but we'll just have to wait and see when we come to it. But anyway, guys, take care, and have an early Merry Christmas. Peace.
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