Spoiler-Free Film Review: “Handling the Undead” (Sundance Film Festival)
I’m a very hard sell on new zombie movies. In a subgenre of horror films that I personally feel is growing ever weaker on originality, I’m open minded, however, in finding new discoveries with a unique take on things. Director Thea Hvistendahl’s Norwegian feature Handling the Undead — adapted from Swedish author John Ajvide Lindqvist’s (Let The Right One In) novel, with a screenplay cowritten by the pair — is one such film, a remarkable dramatic take on the undead. Handling the Undead focuses on grief rather than gore as three families who have lost loved ones find that their deceased members have returned to life — in a sense — after a mysterious phenomenon occurs. The returned ones are weak, barely breathing and sometimes barely moving. The hope from their family members and lovers is felt along with confusion and unease. They have already been grieving, and some now fear that they may lose their loved ones once again.
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