Productions made in an unashamedly genre-centric spirit – such as the New Zealand zombie movie Forgive Us All – have licence to be many things: loud, silly, trope-filled, marinated in gore and splatter. But they should never be boring.
Despite handsome cinematography and picturesque settings, writer-director Jordana Stott’s feature debut doesn’t pass this acid test: it’s dreary and monotonous, as if the terrible virus infecting its post-apocalyptic world has seeped into the movie itself, draining it of life and vitality. Stott clearly intended this to be a “serious” and intensely atmospheric work rather than a splatterific midnight movie. But high art it ain’t, and her heavy-handed approach only sucks any potential fun out of it.
