Zombieland: Double Tap (5 Stars)

I have to criticise the usually very film literate employees of Metropol, the cinema where I watched this film today. I walked up to the counter, and the girl asked me what film I wanted to see. I tapped the counter twice. The girl asked me again. I tapped the counter another twice. I repeated it a few times, and the girl was flustered. She said she didn't understand me. A woman standing at the next counter, who obviously understood what I meant, started laughing. I had to explain it. Oh well. I got my ticket in the end.

This is my 14th horror film for November 2019. It's a sequel to "Zombieland", which was made 10 years ago, although I didn't watch it until last week. I have to admit that I didn't expect a lot of it. Sequels are a risky affair at the best of times, but the longer the sequel is delayed, the greater the chance that it's a piece of junk spewed out by the film studios when they've run out of original ideas.

I was pleasantly surprised how good it was. It reunites the four members of the original cast, and they're as fresh as ever. No dates are mentioned explicitly, but it seems like they've been on the road for 10 years since the last film. That's necessitated by the ageing of Abigail Breslin, who plays Little Rock in both films. She was only 13 when she appeared in the first film, and she looks a lot older now. The other three actors could have got away with it, with the help of a good makeup artist. Come to think of it, Jesse Eisenberg doesn't need any help, because he doesn't look a day older than he was 10 years ago.

After the boys-vs-girls fighting of the first film, they now get on together. They settle down to live in the White House, which is a cosy family residence. Columbus (Jesse Eisenberg) even proposes marriage to Wichita (Emma Stone). It's time for them to settle down and raise little zombie killers.

When they finally venture out of the White House, the film returns to the main plot line of the first film: they want to find other survivors. There might not be many, but there are a few out there.

This is a fun film. At first I felt tempted to rate it four stars, but after sitting down at my keyboard I asked myself what makes it less enjoyable than the first film, and I didn't have an answer.

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