More About Loss Than Survival

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MOVIE REVIEW
We Bury the Dead
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Genre: Horror, Thriller, Drama
Year Released: 2024, 2026 Blu-ray
Runtime: 1h 34m
Director(s): Zak Hilditch
Writer(s): Zak Hilditch
Cast: Daisy Ridley, Brenton Thwaites, Mark Coles Smith, Matt Whelan
Where to Watch: available now, order your copy here: www.moviesunlimited.com or www.amazon.com

RAVING REVIEW: Somehow WE BURY THE DEAD feels like it’s actively avoiding being the movie it was marketed as, and whether that works for you depends entirely on what you came in expecting (that’s not a negative). On the surface, it's a zombie film? (military disaster, mass casualties, the dead rising) But almost immediately, it starts pulling away from those moments, as soon as they appear. What you get instead is something quieter, more introspective, and definitely more interested in grief than survival. That’s the film's personality, but it will also push some people away and pull others in.

The story follows Ava, who enters a quarantined zone after a catastrophic event wipes out a population, volunteering to help recover bodies while secretly searching for her missing husband. It’s a lot to take in, but it also builds tension while giving the character a clear drive. Instead of diving into the urgency or escalating threat, the film deliberately slows everything down. The world isn’t chaotic; it’s still. The horror isn’t constant; that’s probably my favorite part (ironically). It’s intermittent. That approach works in ways, especially when the film leans into the idea that grief doesn’t stop just because the world ends. There’s something about how it portrays loss in a setting where closure isn’t guaranteed, where even death doesn’t provide finality. Ava’s search isn’t just about finding her husband; it’s about confronting everything unresolved between them, and Daisy Ridley carries that so well. She gives the character a determination that never cracks, even when the film around her seems poised to.

It wants to be a character-driven drama, but it’s still inside a genre that demands a certain level of impetus. The zombies themselves are an interesting concept; they’re more restrained, more unpredictable in how they function, but they’re never a part of the story in a way that feels like they needed to be. At times, they feel like an afterthought, something the film just had to include rather than something it builds around. It keeps hinting at something more, whether it’s an escalation in danger or a deeper explanation of what’s happening, but it seldom follows through. Instead, it stays focused on smaller, more personal moments, which would be fine if those moments consistently carried enough weight to sustain the film as a whole. Sometimes they do.

Brenton Thwaites and Mark Coles Smith add something important to the journey, giving Ava different perspectives to play off, but, like much of the film, their arcs feel underexplored. There are glimpses of something more complex beneath the surface, with varied ways of processing loss and responding.

The film does a lot with its setting. And I mean a lot! The empty landscapes, the abandoned homes, and the sense of stillness all contribute to an atmosphere that feels appropriately haunting. There’s a groundedness to it that helps sell the premise, even as the story itself drifts around a bit. The sound design, especially in how it handles the undead, adds to that unease without relying on constant shock or intensity.

After spending so much time building a slow, deliberate tone, it doesn’t quite deliver a payoff that justifies that approach. It’s not that the ending is ineffective; it's just that it feels smaller than what the film seemed to be building toward. There’s a feeling that it’s more interested in maintaining its mood than in providing the expected conclusion, which fits the overall style but doesn’t satisfy you in the ways that you think it should. That’s a difficult critique to write, but it’s my honest view.

This is a film that knows what it wants to be, even if that doesn’t align with what audiences expect from the genre it’s working in. It’s less about fear and more about absence, less about survival and more about what’s left behind. That’s an approach that, when it works, really works, handles this balance with such great care. But it also limits how far the film can go, especially when it doesn’t commit to either side of its identity.

WE BURY THE DEAD lands right in that middle space, but in that space that I still think the watch is so worth it. It’s thoughtful, well-acted, and effective, but it never quite brings all of its ideas together. There’s a stronger film somewhere hiding within the corpses here, one that either leans further into its emotion or embraces the tension of its premise. Instead, it settles somewhere in between, which keeps it from being as impactful as it could have been.

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