TIFF Review: JUAN OF THE DEAD

I could probably count on one hand the amount of Cuban films I’ve seen in my life (which, admittedly, is a pity). I could definitely count on one finger the amount of Cuban zombie films I’ve seen – and I’m all the richer for it.

Following many of the standard tropes, JUAN OF THE DEAD takes the classic zombie formula and moves it to Havana. There we meet Juan, a kind-hearted underachiever who slowly finds himself in the middle of an increasing situation with the recently deceased. After getting a grip on the crisis, he and his friends decide to go into business. Their angle is somewhere in between pest control and Ghostbusters – call them up, and they will come and put down your loved ones for good.

JUAN OF THE DEAD doesn’t really do anything new with the genre – and some have already drawn comparisons to SHAUN OF THE DEAD. One of the elements that makes it a joy to watch though, is its unabashed cheekiness. For instance, the film understands that there is an argument by lovers of the genre about fast-versus-slow zombies. In a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it moment, the film drops that into the situation, which made for good laughs at my screening.

Where this zombie film is different, is in the way that it’s playing out in a poorer setting of a communist country. Because it has these tools available to it, the film is able to get in some great dialogue not yet seen in the genre. What it lacks in originality, it makes up for with pure wit.

While the overall journey is a bit messy, there are some great kills and a lot of laughs to be had along the way. I was also taken with the amount of memorable visuals the film hands us, since the budget must have been tremendously low. Moments like the swarm of zombies surrounding our heroes in the shadow of a Che memorial, or the masses of them walking along the bottom of the sea in the Cuban harbours were both indelible images.

Great images aside, what makes this film work is its sense of humour. Very little is played straight, and I could use up terrabytes spelling out every joke that the film contains, but I hold fast to the lofty notion that this film might someday get picked up and get a bit of play, in which case I wouldn’t want to spoil jokes like the dance Juan and a zombie do while trying to kill each other (dammit!).

What JUAN OF THE DEAD has more than anything else, is a true joy for the genre. It doesn’t want to reinvent anything, since it firmly shows that it thinks it was all invented just fine the first time thank-you. What it wants to do instead is take the zombie story out of its comfort zone – return it to its roots in a way – and set it somewhere we haven’t seen before. That way, we can dig into some new ideas and new situations, and it will all feel fresh.