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Subscribe to weekly newsletter » times & tickets in theaters Fandango Search movie Warm Bodies more current releases » showtimes and buy tickets. / / / January 31, 2013 one-minute movie reviews

by Richard Roeper about us still playing As much as I enjoy "The cast & credits About the site » Walking Dead" on AMC and The Loneliest Planet Wuthering Heights movies such as "28 Days R Nicholas Hoult 56 Up Site FAQs » Julie Teresa Palmer Later," one of my ongoing Amour complaints about the Nora Analeigh Tipton Contact us » Anna Karenina explosion of the zombie M Rob Corddry Broken City Email the Movie genre is the general mopery Grigio John Malkovich Bullet to the Head Answer Man » and overall predictability of The Central Park Five those ever-staggering Summit Entertainment presents a Chasing Ice Citadel creatures. film written and directed by Consuming Spirits on sale now Jonathan Levine. Based on the They lurch. They snarl. Fat Kid Rules the World novel by Isaac Marion. Running They sniff the air for the Gangster Squad scent of human flesh. They time: 97 minutes. Rated PG-13 (for Generation P pounce and gnaw. They zombie violence and some Happy People: A Year in the Taiga Hitchcock pound windows and doors, language). Hyde Park on Hudson and express frustration The Impossible when confronted with 10- In the Hive foot-high cyclone fences. Killing Them Softly And then they get shot in The Last Stand the head and die. Life of Pi Buy now » Printer-friendly » LUV That's pretty much it. We E-mail this to a friend » Mama almost never get inside the The Matchmaker rotted mind of the zombie or Mea Maxima Culpa: Silence In The House of God see things from the zombie Movie 43 Zero stars point of view. They're Neighboring Sounds forever penned in as the Big Metaphor. New Jerusalem Oscar shorts: Animation No star rating One of the many exhilarating pleasures of "Warm Bodies" is the Oscar shorts: Live action No star rating Parker flipping of that script. This is a bloody fresh twist on the most popular Buy now » Playing for Keeps horror genre of this century, with none-too-subtle echoes of a certain Quartet star-crossed romance that harks back to a certain bard who placed a Red Dawn certain young Romeo under a certain balcony. Rise of the Guardians Scrooge & Marley I kinda love this movie. "Warm Bodies" is a well-paced, nicely Silver Linings Playbook directed, post-apocalyptic love story with a terrific sense of humor Sister and the, um, guts to be unabashedly romantic and unapologetically Somewhere Between optimistic. Stand Up Guys Starlet Buy now » Looking a little like a boy-band heartthrob who won first place at a Struck by Lightning Hollywood Halloween party thanks to a a professional makeup job Tales of the Night and an artfully bloodied red hoodie, Nicholas Hoult gives an earnest This Must Be the Place and winning performance as "R," who could be a character in "Perks and winning performance as "R," who could be a character in "Perks Tiger Tail in Blue of Being a Wallflower" or a John Hughes movie, if not for the small The Trouble with the Truth fact he's undead, having been recently zombified. (R's attempt to fill The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn - Part 2 us in on the exact nature of the zombie apocalypse is one of the film's Warm Bodies many affectionate nods to the all-too-familiar elements of so many West of Memphis zombie TV shows and movies.) Zero Dark Thirty more current releases » Unable to recall even his full first name (he's pretty sure it begins with Buy now » the letter R), the kid knows he's a zombie and doesn't deny his hunger for living human flesh — but there are still traces of a real on dvd person inside. He spends his days lurching about an airport where he imagines the previous lives of his fellow zombies, listens to music in new on dvd the grounded airplane he's converted into something of a condo and establishes the beginnings of a bond with M (Rob Corddry in a scene-stealing performance), who also seems to have more than a more new on dvd » trace of his former humanity still lurking deep within. coming on dvd

Buy now » Working from Isaac Marion's short story-turned-novel, writer-director Jonathan Levine infuses "Warm Bodies" with stylistic flourishes and winking in-jokes — some of them subtle, some so obvious characters more coming on dvd » are compelled to comment on them. ("What? It's funny!" says the great movies on dvd delightful Analeigh Tipton when she chooses a particular song to accompany a makeover montage.) more great movies on dvd » There are three distinct species populating the Earth post-worldwide infection nightmare:

Buy now » Humans. They're scarred from seeing spouses, children and friends turned into zombies or killed, but they're armed and they WILL shoot any corpse that comes within growling distance of their walled city.

Zombies. Wandering the streets, living in airports and warehouses, always on the alert for the next human meal. Maybe hopelessly lost. Maybe not.

"The Bonies." Zombies that have given up all hope and have resorted Buy now» to tearing off their own flesh, leaving behind skeletal killing creatures that would just as soon take down a zombie as a human.

There's a key difference between the dead and the really and truly dead — a difference that comes to light when R strikes up a bond with Julie (Teresa Palmer). Granted, their "meet cute" involves mass slaughter and the consumption of one character's brains, which allows a zombie to access a dead character's memory. But other than those small details, the courtship of R and Julie isn't all that different from what we've seen in any number of human/human as well as Buy now» human/supernatural creature romances, including the "Twilight" movies. Hoult and Palmer have a lovely, natural chemistry, even when the circumstances are grisly or silly — or both.

Perhaps recognizing there's no way he can out-crazy the material, John Malkovich actually delivers a relatively restrained performance as Julie's father, who of course is the leader of the military force that believes in shooting first, asking questions never. This guy's so hard- core, he probably wouldn't let his daughter date Tim Tebow, let alone Buy now» a zombie who's desperately trying to get in touch with his human side. ("That could have gone better," says Julie with deadpan understatement after Dad finally meets R.)

"Warm Bodies" isn't perfect. It's a shame those Bonies are mediocre special-effects creations that run with a herky-jerky style that would have been mocked by the 1991-era "Terminator 2" liquid-metal dude. Some of the musical choices are too broad and easy. And even after we get the message, the message is delivered at least two or three more times.

But those are minor drawbacks. Clocking in at a brisk 97 minutes, "Warm Bodies" is terrific entertainment. A lot of zombie movies have heart — but usually the heart ends up on someone's plate. Cheers to "Warm Bodies" for taking us in a different direction for a change.