Anna And The Apocalypse ★★★★ ½ | Movie Review

Synopsis


A zombie apocalypse threatens the sleepy town of Little Haven - at Christmas - forcing Anna and her friends to fight, slash and sing their way to survival, facing the undead in a desperate race to reach their loved ones. But they soon discover that no one is safe in this new world, and with civilization falling apart around them, the only people they can truly rely on are each other.


Review


When this originally came out I was devastated not to get to see it at the cinema, with only regional screenings in Scottish Cineworlds I wasn't going to see it without an excessively long round trip. I knew I had to buy it as soon as it was available, after all, a musical with zombies and Christmas... what's not to love?!

There's genuine festive joy in here, yes it's a little blood-stained, but still... festive joy. There are Christmas trees, an innuendo-filled song and Santa, it's probably more on the non-Christmas side of festive watchlists but I'm here for it anyway.

The songs are fantastic, they're fun and catchy with some great dance montages. It really does peak on the musical side of things. My only quibble would be Paul Kaye's song "Nothing's Gonna Stop Me Now", it's a little cheesy and doesn't feel quite like the tone of the rest of the film. On repeated viewings though it does grow on you, but not quite enough to jump off the bottom spot.

You do need that comedy villain to hate though and in that respect Paul Kaye certainly does really well. In fact the whole cast were great, and there isn't even a caveat. "They were great... considering it's a monster movie." Every performance fit with their character and they managed to make an apocalyptic film feel really upbeat. Everyone had the right amount of pizzazz in them to make this zombimas spectacular come to life.

Being focused on such a small group and area meant that it was really easy to engage with what was going on. It's filmed really nicely as well with your classic background zombie action for comedy effect. All in all this is an enjoyable (sort of) Christmas film and has something for everyone in the family.

What you should do


Put on your dancing shoes, do some vocal exercises and tool up with your zombie fighting gear and put this on your TV this Christmas.

Movie thing you wish you could take home


I'll be adding to my apocalypse survival training, one giant candy cane needed.

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