Review: Life After Beth
Please note: This article is published as an archive copy from Philadelphia City Paper. My City Paper is not affiliated with Philadelphia City Paper. Philadelphia City Paper was an alternative weekly newspaper in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. The last edition was published on October 8, 2015.
Baena's script feels like a dashed-off first draft that could use a few other pairs of eyes on it.
City Paper grade: D
Zombie films have become ubiquitous, cluttering theaters and VOD platforms alike, so it’s about time that the living dead industry churns out some entries that focus less on the flesh-eating and more on the heart-breaking. I Heart Huckabees co-writer Jeff Baena’s Life After Beth has been loudly trumpeted as a “zom-rom-com” (never mind that Warm Bodies beat it to the punch by a year, and Return of the Living Dead 3 by more than 20), and the idea of viewing the outbreak of the zombie apocalypse through a more personal lens is a good one. But Baena’s script feels like a dashed-off first draft that could use a few other pairs of eyes on it — preferably female ones, as Baena uses the title character’s resurrection as an excuse to replay tired “crazy ex-girlfriend” cheap shots. Aubrey Plaza throws herself into the part, especially as her undead instincts start to overpower her humanity, but she’s never allowed a personality of her own. She exists solely through the eyes of her boyfriend, Zach (Dane DeHaan), who welcomes her return until he starts seeing the flaws in his idealized first love, especially after meeting Anna Kendrick and her usual adorableness. The laziness of its execution means that Life After Beth offers nothing new as either a coming-of-age or a losing-of-life story.
