Night of the Living Deb 2015

There is no doubt and no debate this film is the cute American cousin of Shaun of the Dead even up to the point of the ‘puntastic’ name. A title like this makes a bold statement to any potential viewer. It says zombie apocalypse and ‘we’re funny’ too. With this sitting at the front-end of the film it has to be good otherwise the potential fall-out was going to be horribly horrendous for the film-makers.

Firstly, this is an American film so the humour is going to be based in the more relationship, kooky and upbeat style rather than the downbeat, break-up, cynical style of Shaun of the Dead. Bearing that in mind for the British viewer [at least] this style lives or dies by the people acting the story.

I am pleased to report that Night of the Living Deb had a gem up its sleeve in the charming and pitch-perfect Maria Thayer who breathed some life into the lead role of Deb. As a character Deb is fun, under-confident but smart and resourceful and slightly deranged. A lesser actress could have easily mashed this into a one dimensional, self-centred, annoying, ‘kook-fest’ but Thayer really managed to hit the absolutely spot-on note with Deb. After ten minutes, even though her actions were annoying and as I said slightly deranged I already liked her and wanted to see her get the pretty-boy and win the day.

Deb’s potential beau, Ryan, could rub you up the wrong way being a tad too sincere and ‘right-on’ but much like Thayer, Michael Cassidy, in his role managed to instil enough likeableness to make you like him despite being irritated by him. Therein lies the trick, you start to feel exactly how Deb feels about him and straight away the story works – never mind the zombie nonsense. This is a hard trick to pull for an actor because the temptation to play the roles ‘writ large’ must be high. So credit to director Kyle Rankin and Michael Cassidy but especially Maria Thayer who almost single handedly moved this film up a few notches in viewability.

The supporting cast characters are slightly more lightly sketched out with Syd Wilder’s Stacy seemingly there only to be the ‘horrible girlfriend/boyfriend’ mainstay of comic romances that serve only to prove the heroine should be with the hero. Shame really but breaking formulae and staying popular is very difficult.

Ray Wise plays his usual ‘lizard-like’ smooth older baddie but slightly less shallow than some of his other similar roles but with his brushed backed silver mane and tanned skinned with flashing gleaming white teeth you feel he’s done it all before.

I was really pleased to see Chris Marquette turn up as Ryan’s stepbrother. Another slightly stereo-typical movie role and written to be annoying, Marquette somehow makes him likable, a testament to the likability of the actor more than how the role was written.

The story is slight and really a backdrop for the romantic elements. There are no mass amounts of gore and there are a few good jokes at the expense of the genre. The zombie effects are minimal and actually the movie is all the better for that but if you are looking for thrilling and scary zombie movie, albeit a romantic comedy, this really is not that film.

In all honesty I watched this film thinking I would turn it off after about ten minutes but I snorted, chuckled and laughed inside those first minutes and if I’m honest fell a little in love with Deb and so I watched it all the way through.

I am fairly certain there will be a group of people who will take a dislike to this movie but if it hits the right note with you, as it did with me, and you’re in the right mood, and are not looking for anything heavy or serious but just a bit of silly fun, much like Deb, this film will be for you.