"What's Left of Us" - UK DVD review.

Set against the backdrop of a zombie apocalypse, comes Argentinian director Christoph Behl’s “What’s Left of Us”, which is released to UK DVD and VOD outlets this May.

 

Following the exploits of 3 survivors, Ana (Victoria Almeida), her boyfriend Jonathon (William Prociuk) and their friend Axel (Lautaro Delgado). They’ve managed to survive by heavily fortifying their apartment building and scavenging supplies, but the months cooped up together have begun to take their toll.

 

Tempers are beginning to fray as the trio have little to do but stare at the walls all day. So to alleviate the boredom, Ana begins making a video diary for posterity’s sake. Axel goes overboard with his tattoos and begins to cover himself in them, whilst Jonathon grabs one of the zombies from outside and chains him up in the backroom so they can use him as a punchbag, and well, that’s pretty much it really…

 

Virtually the entire film takes place inside their apartment, showing them sat around getting on each others nerves, so you don’t actually see anything of the apparent zombie apocalypse outside. Indeed, I don’t think it fair to even call this a zombie film at all, given that the only zombie you really see is the one they’re keeping chained up out back.

 

If anything, it was like a particularly bad episode of Big Brother, as it’s essentially just 2 hours of watching these people locked in a house, making video diaries and going stir-crazy with boredom and very little else. The apocalyptic scenario outside may as well have been a virus or chemical warfare or something, from what little we see of it.

 

It doesn’t help that the film is in Argentinian with English subs. Ordinarily, this wouldn’t be a problem, as there are many foreign language films that I have enjoyed. But when the film really isn’t all that entertaining to begin with, it merely adds to the tedium.

 

Originally filmed under the title “El Desierto” (The Desert), to summarise, I personally did not enjoy this one at all. And to be quite honest, unless you like obscure foreign language art films, I doubt anyone else will either.

 

Anyway, the film is released to UK DVD and VOD May 11th. Check it out if you feel so inclined.

View the trailer on YouTube.

Pre-order the DVD from Amazon.co.uk