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<\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\nThe\nweekend before Halloween is notoriously bad for new releases. Everyone is going\nto want to see a Halloween movie, so it doesn\u2019t pay to release something\noutside of horror or at least a horror-themed comedy. But it also doesn\u2019t\nreally pay to release a Halloween movie, because those movies have a shelf life\nof exactly one weekend and then they\u2019re pass\u00e9. The \u201cbig\u201d new movie in the slot\nthis year was the horror movie \u201cCountdown,\u201d which was never going to be any\nmore than a one-weekend wonder. It didn\u2019t even pull that off, opening at #5 at\nthe weekend box office amidst terrible reviews. I saw it, and yeah, it was\ngarbage. The rest of the chart saw \u201cJoker\u201d (which I\u2019ve already reviewed)\nreclaim the #1 spot, \u201cMaleficent: Mistress of Evil\u201d (which I\u2019ve already\nreviewed) slip to #2, \u201cThe Addams Family\u201d (which I\u2019ve already reviewed) perk up\na spot to #3, and \u201cZombieland: Double Tap\u201d at #4. I haven\u2019t reviewed that last\none yet, so thank you, \u201cZombieland: Double Tap,\u201d for saving me from having to\nthink too hard about \u201cCountdown.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cZombieland\u201d\nwas a 2009 comedy about survivors of a zombie apocalypse joining forces and\ngoing on a wacky road trip looking for a safe haven and Twinkies. The new film\nopens with the same four survivors (Jesse Eisenberg, Woody Harrelson, Emma\nStone, and Abagail Breslin) finding such a haven in the abandoned White House. I\ndon\u2019t know how safe the White House would be in such a situation, my\nunderstanding is that it has many, many staffers, so there should be no\nshortage of zombies roaming about. But I can forgive this stretch of logic\nbecause it leads to gags like a portrait of William Howard Taft (the only\nPresident to also serve as Chief Justice of the Supreme Court\u2026 and also the\nreally heavy one who got stuck in a bathtub) being used as cheap wrapping paper\nfor what I understand to be the only gun a civilian ever got into the Oval\nOffice. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
The\nteam splits up, with Stone and Breslin ditching the boys, but then Stone\nrejoins them after Breslin ditches her to run off with a phony musician (Avan\nJogia). The group picks up an idiotic new fourth member (Zoey Deutch) and they\ntrade the house of the President for the house of The King. Well, not Graceland\nper se, but an Elvis-themed nearby hotel run by Rosario Dawson and frequented\nby Harrelson and Eisenberg clones Luke Wilson and Thomas Middleditch. Eventually\nthe group has to go protect Breslin in a hippie commune that doesn\u2019t believe in\nguns, but does believe in zombie-attracting fireworks. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
I\ndon\u2019t have a lot of strong opinions about \u201cZombieland: Double Tap.\u201d Most of the\njokes land (my favorite gag has a certain Italian landmark finally toppling\nafter 800 years) and most of the action is funny and compelling. I could have\nused more of it in place of the constant tension over the team splitting up. We\nget it, they\u2019re a dysfunctional family; they\u2019re going to argue, but they\u2019re\ngoing to be there for each other in the end. We got beaten over the head with\nthis concept in the first \u201cZombieland,\u201d there\u2019s no reason to keep doing it\nhere. Also, I worry about fingers getting bitten in the climactic zombie\nbattle. Still, I liked this movie just fine. It\u2019s worth a viewing circa\nHalloween and then forgotten soon after. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Grade: B-<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cZombieland: Double Tap\u201d is rated R\nfor bloody violence, language throughout, some drug and sexual content. Its\nrunning time is 99 minutes. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
By Bob Garver The weekend before Halloween is notoriously bad for new releases. Everyone is going to want to see a Halloween movie, so it doesn\u2019t pay to release… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8,"featured_media":45149,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[108],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/45148"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/8"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=45148"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/45148\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/45149"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=45148"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=45148"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=45148"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}