Scouts Guide to the Zombie Apocalypse (United States, 2015)

For nearly as long as there have been horror movies, filmmakers have had fun trolling the genre. The first “official” such entry was Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein but that offbeat film, which featured many of the sanctioned Universal Monsters (including Bela Lugosi reprising his iconic role as Dracula for the one and only time), was only the tip of the iceberg. In the Romero zombie era, although there have been plenty of straightforward horror entries focused on the undead monstrosities, there have probably been as many comedic riffs. While none have been better than Shaun of the Dead, the 2015 under-the-radar release, Scouts Guide to the Zombie Apocalypse, is at least moderately successful. It’s never remotely scary but there are some solid laughs, a decent amount of over-the-top gore, and a grotesque scene featuring a zombie penis. There’s also a sense that this could have been more enjoyable but director Christopher Landon (who also had a hand in the screenwriting process) isn’t sure how much seriousness to inject into the proceedings. Hence, there’s a fair amount of buddy movie/friendship material that succeeds only in interrupting the mayhem and arresting the pace.

The movie begins with a short scene that explains how the titular Zombie Apocalypse begins. (It involves a distracted scientist, an idiot janitor, and a vending machine that doesn’t work properly.) The scene then shifts to a typical suburban town where three high school students – Ben (Tye Sheridan), Carter (Logan Miller), and Augie (Joey Morgan) – are recruiting for their Boy Scouts chapter, which is led by Scout Leader Rogers (David Koechner). They are on an outdoor camp-out when the Zombie Apocalypse arrives. Scout Leader Rogers is an early victim and two of the scouts nearly fall victim to the undead at a strip club when they are saved by Denise (Sarah Dumont), a “cocktail waitress” who’s handy with a shotgun. Before leaving town for an evacuation site, the scouts decide to do what they can to save all the teens attending a “Secret Seniors Party,” but they face two obstacles: finding out where the event is being held and convincing the attendees that there’s a zombie threat.

Scouts Guide to the Zombie Apocalypse doesn’t try to do anything exceptional, but it might have been more successful if Zombieland, which came out six years earlier, hadn’t attempted a lot of the same things, and done them better. Here, the zombies are more often played for fun than as creatures of terror. The aforementioned penis prosthetic is one example (is it actually nudity if it’s not real?) as is a scene in which Denise blasts away at a large group of the undead as if she’s engaged in target practice.

The bonding material featuring the three scouts doesn’t work. Carter is a onetime nerd who wants to hang with the popular crowd. Augie, on the other hand, loves scouting and all it represents. And Ben is stuck in between, trying to please both his friends. The movie tries to focus on their interactions but the tone is all wrong, the screenplay doesn’t do a good job with this aspect, and the actors lack the chops to pull it off. In fact, the movie would have worked better if it had amplified the role of Denise, who’s infinitely more interesting than Ben, Carter, and Augie combined. Her flirtatious/friendly banter with Ben is arguably the best non-zombie material the movie contains.

The film was a major bomb at the box office, making less than $4M domestic against a $15M production budget. It has achieved some success in its post-theatrical life but not nearly enough to give it the coveted “cult classic” label. The cast isn’t exactly stocked with A-list names (unlike Zombieland), although some might recognize Tye Sheridan, David Koechner, and (?!?) Cloris Leachman, and director Christopher Landon hasn’t really broken through (although his Happy Death Day did nicely for what it was). Scouts Guide to the Zombie Apocalypse is the kind of movie one might happily watch (and perhaps even enjoy) if one stumbled upon it while randomly searching, but it is neither high enough in profile nor good enough overall to warrant tracking it down.

Scouts Guide to the Zombie Apocalypse (United States, 2015)