In what ways did “Warm Bodies” surpass my expectations? Ultimately, it’s a clever delight, a well-written, well-paced teen romance that captures all the right things about adolescence. Much like the TV show “Buffy the Vampire Slayer” did back in the ’90s and early ’00s, “Warm Bodies” has a juxtaposed sense of sarcasm and sentiment. The film is aware of its status as yet another in the long line of zombie releases; there’s an assumption that the audience will just get some of the elements of zombie lore and backstory without needing to be told. And yet, with that matter-of-factness, there’s a simultaneous need for human contact, for personal relationships, for sincere emotion. It’s that balance that makes “Warm Bodies” work so well.
Sure, the characters are named R and Julie and that seems like a reductive, cheap allusion to “Romeo and Juliet.” But we all want to be loved, don’t we? We all want to feel real things, even if those things are as simple as friendship and curiosity and wonder. Director and writer Jonathan Levine, whose last project was 2011’s “50/50,” gets that; it’s why that film starring Joseph Gordon-Levitt and Seth Rogen was both heart-breaking and inspiring. You have to take the bad with the good. “Warm Bodies” is more frothy than “50/50″—cancer is obviously more tragic than funny, even though that film had its moments—but it has some nice weight, too. There are recognizable feelings on display. And man, do leads Nicholas Hoult and Teresa Palmer get them.
Adapted from the novel by Isaac Marion, “Warm Bodies” begins with young zombie R (Hoult, of “Clash of the Titans” and “X-Men: First Class”), who, through voiceover narration, tells us of the mysterious zombie outbreak and his status of a member of the undead. He knows he should stand up straight, eat better, and take more care of himself, but hey—”I shouldn’t be so hard on myself. We’re all dead.” So R spends his days walking around an airport, sometimes meeting up with his friend M (Rob Corddry, of “The Muppets,” “Cedar Rapids,” and “Hot Tub Time Machine”) so they can grunt at each other, and avoiding the Bonies, zombies who have so deeply given up on life that they peel off their skin and walk around as skeletons, feeding on anything with a heartbeat. In the zombie hierarchy, they’re on the top—and even though a group of zombies like R have strength in numbers, the Bonies are faster and more animalistic, seemingly lacking in any kind of humanity.
In contrast, R seems to have an excess of the stuff—and it pops up most when he meets Julie (Teresa Palmer, of “The Sorcerer’s Apprentice,” “I Am Number Four,” and “Take Me Home Tonight”). One of the last remaining humans in the area, Julie happens to be the daughter of human resistance leader Gen. Grigio (John Malkovich, of “Transformers: Dark of the Moon” and “Jonah Hex”) and already has a boyfriend, fellow human Perry (Dave Franco, of “Charlie St. Cloud,” “Fright Night,” and “21 Jump Street”). But when R sees Julie, something in him changes. Some part of him, which remembers what it was like to be human, reacts to her presence, inviting her into his airplane home of collected trinkets and vinyl records (including Bruce Springsteen and Bob Dylan; the guy has good taste). And Julie, in turns, realizes that her father’s propaganda about how all zombies are “uncaring, unfeeling, incapable of remorse” might not be so true.
What this all leads to, of course, is R and Julie somehow working together to save the world. (We’re all thinking it, so I might as well address it.) But what “Warm Bodies” does right before getting to that big-problem-with-a-big-climactic-ending is navigate issues of identity in a believable, recognizable way. Julie, a girl who has spent the last eight years of her life in a zombie hell, is understandably suspicious of R at first. But, in a reminder of how resilience youth can be, she adapts to his presence in a way that shows promise for the future. She doesn’t bow to his will or her father’s, but navigates an in-between space that acknowledges her relationship with R while appealing to the humanism her father had forgotten. It’s a good role for Palmer, and a far more inspirational-for-girls one than anything Bella Swan has ever done in “Twilight.”
But this film wouldn’t be successful without Hoult, and here’s the thing: He’s perfect. It’s to Levin’s credit that he streamlined the original novel into this film, which gives R more of a believable teen sensibility than the melodrama of the book. The character is immediately likeable and sympathetic, though, because of Hoult’s performance, which captures the growth of R throughout the course of the film. From his initial zombie grunt and gait to his later gazing at Julie with a look of complete wonder to his eventual decision to change his life—to, you know, actually live—Hoult imbues R with the smartness and sincerity that just blows off the screen. The boy from “About a Boy”—well, now he’s a star.
The only gripe could be that the Bonies look corny, the victim of bad CGI. But … that’s basically it? And that’s a minor complaint when the rest of the film is so extraordinary.
At one point in “Warm Bodies,” Julie tells R of her life, “In my world, people die all the time.” That’s not so different from our own world, is it? And it’s that remarkable similarity to our own reality that makes “Warm Bodies” so successful. Yes, it’s a zombie romance. But it’s the sweetest, most believable zombie romance you’ll ever see.
