Film4 FrightFest 2013 Review - The Dead 2: India (2013)

It's fair to say that the zombie sub-genre, like found footage, has become very tired and almost lazy. Every first-time horror filmmaker dives into the genre and not a week goes by where you don't see another zombie based movie flood the bottom shelves of your local ASDA. However the ones that are successful are the ones who try to do something different with it - which The Dead 2: India does very well, even if it doesn't quite hit the mark.

American wind turbine engineer Nicholas Burton (Joseph Millson) is hundreds of miles away from Mumbai when he discovers that his girlfriend Ishani (Meenu) is pregnant. But their good news is batted away as quickly as it was received as a zombie outbreak infects the country causing the recently dead to attack the living. With Ishani locked in her house with her father (Sandip Datta Guppa) and her bitten mother (Poonam Mathur), Nicholas begins a cross-country trek to save and protect the woman he loves.

Where The Dead 2: India works is that the zombie outbreak and subsequent attacks play second fiddle to the main storyline of Nicholas trying to get to his girlfriend, while at the same time get the approval of her father who isn't keen on him. The zombies of course act as the catalyst to this, but it's the human drama that moves the plot forward.

For the most part, the performances are really strong too. Millson doesn't have much more to do than react to things happening around him, but the pain of not being able to see his pregnant girlfriend (which is helped by some forced backstory) comes across in every one of his actions. Along the way he is helped by a young boy named Javed (played by Anand Gopal) who is spellbinding in his role. For his first film, the kid shines in every scene and his relationship with Nicholas is one of the movie's more touching moments. The same can be said for Datta Guppa who, again in his first role, is fantastic as the disapproving father. However, the side is let down somewhat by Meenu who delivers all of her dialogue with the conviction of a wet cloth. Of everyone, she has the least amount to do, but she doesn't handle any of it particularly well.

But where The Dead 2: India fails however is in its execution. The plot is simple, but the movie never tries to be anything more than moving from scene A to scene B via plot device C. At times it feels like a video game with each new level bringing its own challenges but you never feel like your moving forward. The pacing never allows for any progression and the audience aren't clued into how far or close Nicholas is to his end goal. On top of that, the zombies don't ever feel like a genuine threat, with most of the attacks being given an almost Resident Evil style shrug off. When they are attacking the slums it does feel quite intense, but the external scenes with Nicholas just feel like inconveniences as opposed to life threatening dangers.

You could forgive the Ford Brothers for some mistakes as they did everything on the set of the movie, but some of its action scenes are handled quite clumsily with too many close-up shaky cam shots that never clues you into what's actually happening. Other scenes are shot with a bit more dignity with some great practical effects, but they can't make up for the ones that came before it. It's frustrating as this doesn't help the movies lack of scares, which tend to be rarer than rocking horse droppings.

The film also tries to force in a political point during the climax along with some goofy contrivances to force the movie's moral down your throat. At times The Dead 2: India feels like a solid zombie movie, but at others it drops the ball. By and large, it's not the worst zombie movie ever made and it probably isn't even the worst one this year, but it is poor in places and can even be a bit dull at times.

Flickering Myth Rating - Film: ★ ★  / Movie: ★ ★

Luke Owen is one of Flickering Myth's co-editors and the host of Flickering Myth's Podcast Network. You can follow him on Twitter @LukeWritesStuff.