Nerds That Geek Movie Review – ‘Day of the Dead: Bloodline’

Written by John Edward Betancourt

Whether we like it or not, the remake/reboot/reimagining is here to stay and, in all honesty, it’s something I’ve personally made peace with. Because if a film that is designed to fit that respective genre gets people interested in the power and wonder of the original, then hey… there’s definitely something good to come out of Hollywood’s desire to revisit the past as often as possible.
 
However, despite the peace that I’ve made with these types of motion pictures, there is one glaring expectation that I have in my mind when it comes to each and every one of them; in that, regardless of where the new guard takes the story, the end result needs to be quality and let’s be honest, that’s really where the problem lies when it comes to this style of filmmaking, remakes are often times just not good, and unfortunately the time has come to discuss another rough reimagining; Day of the Dead: Bloodline.
 
Now this particular film, is in fact, the second attempt to reboot one of George A. Romero’s finest films and much like those that came before it, it too is set inside a military bunker, this time within a mountain wherein civilians and members of the military do their best to survive amidst a zombie apocalypse. Now, while this particular iteration of Romero’s vision does feature a few new ideas peppered in the mix as the story progresses, I did make mention of the fact that it is a rough ride and well, I’m not kidding when I say that because this is a bad, bad movie, for several reasons

---

​First and foremost, one of the biggest problems plaguing this story is that it is filled to the brim with bad acting through and through. There really is not a good performance to be found anywhere in this film and well, that creates quite the problem. Because in order to truly be sucked into a horror film, we need to feel genuine terror or distress from the characters and that simply doesn’t exist here and that’s a shame because there are some unique scenes that would have blown me away… had there been a decent performance present on screen.
 
But the problems with this movie don’t end there because the script suffers from some serious issues as well since this film simply doesn’t know what themes or concepts it wants to focus upon. It’s obvious that writers Mark Tonderai and Lars Jacobson wanted to add some kind of depth or meaning to the story as part of their continued homage to Romero’s original, but they never settled on one single concept and the end result of this confusion on paper, is a film that jumps from idea to idea, wherein the characters make scattered and silly decisions.
 
However, all of these issues could have been overlooked and the film could have been appreciated as a respectable B movie remake, if it weren’t for the movie’s biggest issue, the zombie known as Max. Because, something went terribly wrong with the creation of this character and the fact that Max is in essence, an undead sexual predator, completely and utterly ruins the story because it just doesn’t make sense to have a character that jarring and that offensive present in a story such as this and it clearly demonstrates that both the writers and the director, Hèctor Hernández Vicens, were more interested in shocking us than providing us with a quality story.
 
It’s a shame really, because as I mentioned before, there were some moments in this story that could have come together in brilliant fashion. But the end result is what it is, and really, it’s best that this film is avoided at all costs. Don’t rent it. Don’t buy it. Don’t support it in the slightest, and follow that checklist not out of spite, or because the film dilutes Romero’s legacy (it doesn’t, the original Day of the Dead is still available to watch in all of its brilliant glory), but to hammer home the point to production companies, that if you’re going to do the inevitable and produce a remake, make sure the end result is a motion picture that is completely worth watching. 

---