Daisy Ridley in Tasmania-set Thriller We Bury the Dead

Daisy Ridley plays Ava, a woman who hopes her husband will revive after a catastrophe annihilates the population of Tasmania in Zak Hilditch’s film We Bury the Dead.

The movie is set in the aftermath of an accidental detonation of an experimental American weapon that wiped out Tasmania’s residents. Ava volunteers for the state’s body retrieval program, driven by the chance her husband might be alive or at least awake.

Some casualties have reanimated; the military calls the grayish figures brain-dead and shoots any corpses that show signs of life. The film portrays the undead not only as menaces but also as victims of circumstance, with scenes in which the reanimated do little more than cower or flutter their eyelids.

The reviewer calls the picture a neat little thriller that sometimes feels like a reluctant entrant to the zombie subgenre. It includes jump scares and axe-wielding chases that can feel perfunctory, and is most haunting when it gestures at a world dazed with trauma and at personal closure pursued through collective effort.

We Bury the Dead is rated R for carnage down under, runs 1 hour 34 minutes and is in theaters.

Key Topics

Culture, Daisy Ridley, Zak Hilditch, Tasmania, Experimental Weapon, Body Retrieval Program