Must See Movie...

After playing with our expectations, this turns out to be a very different sort of film.

Each character in this movie — down to the smallest one — is an individual rather than a type, prone to spontaneous changes of mood and sometimes amusing outbursts of pettiness or ill humor.

It is a whirlwind of delight --- attractive actors, stunning couture, spectacular sets and outrageous parties. It's a feast for the eyes. But what really makes this dramedy work is the acting.

Arguably the 4.6 Pandemic (2016) has on IMDB is a little harsh, though really it is to expected. Whilst it is a much better stab at the Zombie slasher than many attempts, it is confusing, nauseating and a gross waste of evident budget and acting calibre. However, this film makes big claims and so has to watched at least. The case states the following: 'Pandemic is like nothing you have ever witnessed before. Shot in a completely revolutionary 'First Person Perspective' Pandemic makes YOU the star of the movie. YOU fire every shot and YOU throw every punch.' 'The only hope for a cure is for YOU to lead a team into the field to rescue survivors...' It would appear that whoever wrote this back of the case blurb was unaware of two vitally important things 1) Lady in the Lake (1947) and 2) what actually happens in Pandemic. Indeed, the very same technique was employed by Robert Montgomery in his ambitious, brilliant, but painfully flawed Lady in the Lake. Shot in 1947, when the uninterrupted use of a subjective camera was actually 'revolutionary', Montgomery invites 'You' to solve a murder mystery with him as the camera takes the place of detective Montgomery. Therefore, and regardless of what the packaging says, Pandemic is not revolutionary in the slightest, and anyone ignorant of the history in his field would be well advised to band about terms such as 'revolutionary' with extreme caution. Moreover, some knowledge of what had preceded Pandemic would have seen improvements in the product manifest beyond its cover, as the film itself exhibits many of the flaws suffered by the sibling 69 years its senior. One of the main problems (of which there were many) faced by Lady in the Lake is the strange position the audience finds itself in. We are to solve a mystery with Montgomery, and yet we find ourselves, visually at least, in place of Montgomery. We are neither Montgomery nor not Montgomery, we are seeing what he is seeing, yet overtly aware of not seeing him. We have his eyes, sometimes his hands, but we are with him and not him. It is a confusing relationship held between Lady in the Lake and its audience, one which resulted in unfair dismissal of the subjective camera by many critics, and a fairer though unfortunate dismissal of the film. All that said, at least the 'You' in Lady in the Lake meant us, and whilst there may have been confusion with our relationship to Montgomery and his co-stars, we were still 'us' and free to figure all that out for ourselves. Pandemic and its premise however bring about a new level of confusion regarding the 'You' and the 'I' of its attempted sharing of subjective experience. The 'You' referred to so excitedly on the cover of Pandemic explicitly indicates that 'I' am to lead a team into the field to rescue survivors, the product of such an excursion somehow being a cure for the infection that earned the film its name. Holes in the concept become immediately apparent when 'I' am a camera in a smart phone looking at female protagonist Dr. Lauren Case. Granting benefit of the doubt, one is able to excuse this odd occurrence as it is Dr. Case' phone and the film uses personal cameras to obtain its footage. However things become undeniably farcical when 'I' become a cantankerous drill sergeant staring at Dr. Case as 'I' complain about something, not even wearing the odd apparatus that contains the personal camera. And the farce gains momentum as 'I' become an array of cctv cameras, an angry colleague, a dead colleague, another colleague, sometimes I don't even know what 'I' am as a result of crazed cutting and bizarre content, though I am certainly not leading a team into a field of any kind. At least I don't think 'I' am. By the time the film had ended I wished that 'I' had fallen victim to the infection early on in the saga and escaped lightly with an early death, as I feel the brain damage suffered by a 'level 5' would have damaged my brain far less than trying to make sense of what Pandemic presented before me. A few cool shots, a few interesting ideas, but ultimately trite and stupid.

I have seen The Chosen One starring Rob Schneider and I would say that this one is worse.I have seen Gummo and I would still say that this one is worse. Writing a Zombie movie is really not that difficult. In the amount of time that it is taking me to write this review I am certain that I can write a better movie than this abomination.This is the type of movie that will put you off watching movies for a while. If you were to watch this movie immediately followed by The Godfather & The Shawshank Redemption you will hate them both since you would have developed a hatred towards cinema by now. If I had a time machine I would go back in time and beat the living hell out of the directors career guidance counselor. I would go back and admonish his parents for allowing him to pursue a career in directing. A part of me died after watching this movie. I no longer have a will to go on. If the director & Justin Bieber were hanging off a cliff and I could save only one I would pull up Justin Bieber. After watching this brain numbing movie I want to become a Zombie really badly just so that I can eat the Directors brain and save the world from any future torment that this director might be inclined to make. When it comes to Zombie movies the choices for storyline are endless but for some reason this clown decided that he will make a movie shot entirely using helmet cams. It is distressing to the eyes and the brain to sit through this one. I hope the director gets eaten alive by Zombies.This is without a shadow of doubt the absolute worst movie that I have ever seen.

After I saw the trailer for "Pandemic" by sheer luck on YouTube, I just had to track down this movie and get it watched, especially since I am a huge zombie aficionado. And the trailer for 2016's "Pandemic" looked really intense.Well, at least the trailer was intense. The actual movie, meh... It was actually semi-boring, which was somewhat of a disappointment and a slap to the face. I must expect that I had expected a lot more from this movie after having seen that trailer.Certainly there were some good parts to the movie, and those parts had lots of action and a really great and fast pace to it. And that was really what held the movie afloat.This is not a movie that is driven by acting performances or by character development. Actually the characters in "Pandemic" were very mundane and generic, to the point where you didn't really care if they died or survived, and it didn't matter who died and who survived, because they were essentially the same character, just with a different face.The acting in the movie was fair enough, taking into consideration the limitations that the acting talents had to work with in terms of script and direction.The first person view that permeated the movie was a different but not entirely unwelcoming approach to the zombie genre. Sure it has been seen before, but it actually worked out well enough in "Pandemic".A zombie movie needs proper special effects, and honestly, then "Pandemic" was limping here. The special effects and CGI effects were not impressive to be bluntly honest, and that was sort of holding the movie back in a way.Putting the cards on the table, then I have to say that "Pandemic" was an adequate movie in terms of being entertaining. But it was far from being an impressive movie addition in the zombie genre.

I'm not sure why everyone is acting like this film should be critiqued like an academy award contender. Anyone that know the genre knows it's clearly going to be a bit cheesy with not so stellar acting. Now with that being said, I loved it! I'm a bit of a zombie buff and this was pretty good to me. Much better than a lot of other movies out there. Thought it was decent and would definitely recommend it for anyone looking for a decent zombie movie that doesn't follow the traditional zombie cliché genre.