Handling the Undead takes the zombie formula and slows it to a crawl. In all three of its storylines that make up a World War Z-like tableau, a family member returns from the dead in a dazed, unspeaking, clearly zombified state. As their undead nature is uncovered, each of the three families must grieve the final loss of their loved one. Shot with low energy and unobtrusive observation, Handling the Undead is the kind of film that has one looking up synonyms for ‘slow’. Executing its family dramas mostly wordlessly, the leisurely plot doesn’t add much new to the zombie canon. The few scares are rare and far between, tossed between sluggish storylines that never crystallise into much of anything.
We lose interest from the moment the unhurried families each take in their slogging undead members. These are zombies, grey, rotting, and barely breathing. Audiences already know what zombies do and how they work, leading to frustration with the characters. There are lethargic moments in which loved ones try to feed them food, speak to them, and cuddle them; as you can guess, it doesn’t go so well! The whole thing plays out exactly as expected but without excitement. The lackadaisical film wants to be a study of grief, loss, and the psychology of letting go, but its lack of personality and characterization and its over-leaning on archetypes and standard zombie tropes leave us feeling hollow.
This failed experiment in horror is, like this year’s In a Violent Nature, an attempt to elevate the genre while executing its simplest version. The story of the first day of a zombie apocalypse is a monomyth now; to make that story torpid, stagnant, and loitering is a supreme miscalculation.
