Nicole (Lucy Joyce) and Karl (Zak Ozturk) both arrive to school late one morning, with different excuses. Neither gets much sympathy from their teacher (Chris Bearne), though Karl gets the worst of it, and the two decide to meet up after class. Unfortunately, Karl is ill, the kind of ill where you bite someone because they might be tasty. Nicole survives the attack, but that evening she starts to feel a little off as well.
We Are What We Eat then illustrates the type of zombie story with which we’re all familiar, only now the epidemic is spreading through students, with a mix of more original composition coupled with stereotypical zombie imagery. For an example of the former, there’s a rather fun sequence that could easily double for a zombie-fied music video for Pink Floyd’s “Another Brick in the Wall (Part 2)”; adolescent wish-fulfillment for that teacher everyone seems to hate to meet their fate at the mouths of student zombies. But then there’s the typical shots of a bunch of zombies surrounding their victim, and ripping out and feasting on the entrails. Not saying that zombies would behave any other way, but it’s becoming a cliché cinematic zombie attack.
We Are What We Eat is full of promising elements, most exceptional being the cinematography and framing, though the acting early on is a bit wooden. Still, the film looks great and the unique imagery and composition keep it slightly above stereotypical zombie fare. I wasn’t completely on board with the entire tale, when things go full zombie it doesn’t quite fit in as smoothly with the narrative pieces and tone before it, but the parts that the short gets right more than make up for the lesser moments. I’d like to see what the filmmakers can do with a bigger story, because the technical chops are there.
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