In this week's Expatica cinema section - in collaboration with Picturenose - James Drew gets his teeth into 'Diary of the Dead', 'Made of Honor', and 'Forgetting Sarah Marshall'.

George A. Romero's Diary of the Dead

'They won't stay dead!' Thus ran the tagline for George A. Romero's seminal Night of the Living Dead, way back in 1968 and it would appear to have been on the money as, here we are, 40 years later, with the world still ending, not with a bang, nor for that matter a whimper, but rather the sound of relentless shuffling, moaning, screaming and chewing.

In terms of 'sequential' sequels, Romero himself has thus far followed Night... with Dawn of the Dead (1978), Day of the Dead (1985) and Land of the Dead (2005) and there have been many, many spin-offs, including fully fledged remakes of Night... and Dawn..., none of which truly abysmal, but all of which proved that when it comes to flesh-eating zombies, Romero is the master.

And so he has (by and large) once again proved with Diary of the Dead - zombies for the Blair Witch/Cloverfield generation. However, he is facing serious competition this time around - Jaume Balagueró's wonderfully scary 'news coverage carnage' [Rec], recently reviewed on Expatica, is a strong contender for best horror flick since Calvaire (2004), and also has the 'undead' (albeit of a different 'clan') at its core. So, what of George's hyper-real horrors?

Well, thankfully, this is still one hell of a ride. The plot in a nutshell (or case?) has the stark simplicity of Night... (which is the film that this in fact most resembles in overall effect and 'End of the World' gloom) - a group of student filmmakers, led by Jason Creed (Joshua Close) and Andrew Maxwell (Scott Wentworth) are working on their own horror film, when, guess what? The real (or reel?) world suddenly turns terrifying, with the group facing an onslaught of the risen recently deceased, who are, (super)naturally, very, very hungry...

It goes without saying that any Romero 'return to form' (Land of the Dead was, by and large, an insipid mess compared to the earlier films) nevertheless brings pros and cons - Diary... is obvious in places, bloody stupid in others, yet there is also the profound, the amusing and the downright terrifying to be had here, so what say we suspend our disbelief and enjoy? A POV flesh-eating zombie movie was always on the cards - thank your lucky stars that, in an age still largely dominated by carbon-copy horrors, this is the genuine article. Red, raw and dripping.

95 mins.

Made of Honor

Brit director Paul Weiland (a graduate from directing TV's Mr Bean ) and writers Adam Sztykiel and Deborah Kaplan manage to move this latest Patrick Dempsey vehicle away from what might justifiably have been predicted - God-awful trash - into something that's just a little sharper and funnier than its set-up may give you cause to dread.

Chick flick. God, I hate that term, but Made of Honor (and I also hate US spellings of English words, but we won't go into that here) plays around with the format sufficiently to allow more than a few surprising laughs.

Dempsey plays Tom, a serial dater who has stayed close but platonic with Hannah (Michelle Monaghan) for ten years - she wants marriage, but hasn't found the right man. But, just as Tom thinks he may finally be in with a chance, Hannah announces her engagement and, to add insult to injury, asks him to be her 'maid' of honour (and we're spelling it that way now, OK?).

He agrees, but only because he intends to kibosh the wedding and woo the woman. Fun and games...

Dempsey and Monaghan in fact work very well together - chemistry is the customary term, but here there is also genuinely natty comic timing that's rarely seen in rom-com partnerships. Add into the mix some hilarious quick and dirty details (combined, of course, with sentimental moments that manage at least not to swamp proceedings), and what you have for the price of admission is a tasty slice of old-fashioned fun.

101 mins.

Forgetting Sarah Marshall

Director Nicholas Stoller follows up on producer Jud Apatow's recent Knocked Up (2007), Superbad (2007) and The Forty Year-Old Virgin (2007) with the latest 'House of Apatow' offering - Jason Segal (who also wrote the screenplay) plays Peter Bretter, a young musician who works on a CSI-type show starring his girlfriend Sarah Marshall (Kristin Bell), until his girlfriend suddenly announces she wants to be his ex. Peter tries to ease the pain with meaningless sex (lucky man), but it leaves him cold. A trip to Hawaii beckons, but Sarah's there too, with her new man Aldous Snow (to be fair, a brilliant Russell Brand). Cute and fairly amusing is about as good as this gets, but the greatest comedy of all time, which it has already been labelled in certain quarters, it 'aint.

112 mins.

James Drew

'Expatica's weekly cinema-review section is brought to you in collaboration with Picturenose.com'  

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(expatica 2008)