We Bury the Dead

For those looking to delve into more philosophical horror, We Bury The Dead is a thoughtful trek into the unknown.

Sadness is the dominant emotion in this film, not fear. While there are those moments that will accelerate the audience’s hearts, there are also those moments that will open them. After all, zombies were once people, too.

Zak Hilditch has crafted a harrowing, unsettling zombie movie that totally enmeshes the audience in its collapsing world.

For a movie about stinking, bloated corpses, on the whole, this one is surprisingly fresh.

In a genre plagued by a lack of effort, I’ll take a solid try.

There’s a thoughtful zombie tale with its own distinctive personality lurking somewhere within We Bury the Dead, but it’s overridden by the film’s more generic elements, and that identity ultimately gets lost among the horde.

We Bury the Dead is already too slow and mournful to pass as popcorn entertainment, and it’s rarely quite thoughtful enough to bring its art house horror aspirations to life.

Screenplay is mediocre, but it holds up well thanks to its set design, cinematography, and above all, incredible hypnotic music.

Benefiting from a strong start, with a good pace and interesting quantity of informations, 'We Bury the Dead' settles solid basics. The plot is very interesting and manages to be original even though zombie movies go for a long way and struggle to bring something fresh to the **** (Daisy Ridley) triggers empathy and interest at first sight in her quest to find her (living or dead?) husband. The character of Clay (Brenton Thwaites) follows the same pattern. Too bad Ridley's acting is almost bad at some point : she only shows one face during the whole plot, and only teases us of what she could have **** movie deploys a good first act, introducing Riley (Mark Coles Smith), but eventually turning him into a third-zone character. After that, the movie cruelly lacks of content and of scenaristic value. It all falls flat. Dialogues are a perfect example of why this movie is mid : they are long, uninteresting, uneven. The last one is the worst of all. Ending (no spoil), speaking of it, was questionable. In the end I found that 'We Bury the Dead' let way too much room for useless mystery as it lacked time to explain the complexity of its plot. Too many dull moments, too many useless dialogues for such an interesting universe.Zombies are amazing, and some jumpscares are terrific. Too bad it all lacked of zombies in my opinion!Although I have to admit that the music and photography (colors, environment and light) made me give a higher score, they were both excellent. They both contributes to this contemplative (almost meditative at some point) film. Environmental shots showcase the beauty of Australia, and are not far from being iconic. Other action sequences are very interesting too, notably views from the sky. In addition to that, it was very interesting to witness such a film that questions marriage and commitment for life and death through this post-apocaliptical perspective.

The multiplex could use more Amyl & The Sniffers needle drops- but this moody, low-budget Tasmanian teeth-grinding zombie road movie (thanks to the U.S. President detonating a chemical weapon) is far too low-key for its own good.

What?? This is just bad; the only thing that saves it is some of the visuals, acting and ideas. Other than that, everything else just collapses on itself and makes the entire film redundant and unable to find an identity. 4/10. This needed to be way longer, with more interesting lore, action, and scenes that make sense. Daisy Ridley needs to find better roles, honestly, because she has the acting skills. If she wants to get into zombies, horror, and Sci-fi, she needs to look for heavy-hitter franchises, or maybe try comedy; that might be interesting.

It's not a zombie thriller. What does that leave us? Do we get interesting characters with compelling back stories? No. The back stories are at best a 2 out of 10. The movie tries to wrap everything up at the very end into a deep metaphysical experience. Does it achieve this? No. The entire movie was unmoving and a little dull to be honest. Did the writers end on a big, meaningful, secret, unexpected ending? No. By that point, the viewer doesn't care. I didn't walk out of the film, but I thought about it. Even though this is a 2026 movie, I'll lump it in with all the other trash from 2025. Here's hoping the year gets better.