Edgar Wright Marathon Part I of V, 2nd Viewing
Innocent disclaimer: I haven’t sat down to watch any of the Cornetto movies since I was a wee movie fanatic back in middle school, so yeah, this rewatch has taken quite the time to arrive! It really took a worldwide quarantine to get me to rewatch this beloved Edgar Wright project, but it’s been done.
Shaun of the Dead I often fancy as the 2000s prime example of a partially conventional narrative—in this case, one about the loser who learns to become a leader when faced with newly endeavored hardships—that ascends above its dilemmas due to its original engineering within the actual style of its visual presentation—something the art of cinema is very good at replenishing. It’s furthermore no surprise that Wright’s side-splitting mockeries of the zombie genre come in handy when overcompensating for its mawkish plot. As silly as it sounds, in this rendition of the common tale, it took an apocalypse for the loser to finally confront all the obstacles in his life. Ironic, maybe?
Wright is quite creative when it comes to executing visual comedy—a rare act that’s sadly troublesome to come by these days. In my mind, however, the precision-shanking editing combined with this estimable facet is what makes Wright’s films seem so above the average. It’s no muss to say an amusing joke or to blatantly tell the viewer that something intense is about to happen, but considering Wright uses all these shocking outlets to emphasize more onto the straightforward gag or scare, whether it be from the arrangement of the sound or the uncanny framing of shots, it makes the imagery and satire of his movies come off as keenly unpredictable when they can easily be otherwise.
Verdict: B
Kings of Comedy (Ranked List) [Coming Soon]
“Shaun of the Dead” is now available to stream on YouTube, Google Play, Vudu, iTunes, Amazon Prime, and Hulu.
Burning the Celluloid 
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