EXIT HUMANITY (2012) Review

Directed by: John Geddes

Starring: Mark Gibson, Adam Seybold, Bill Moseley, Dee Wallace

The zombie film is probably the one subgenre of horror movies which is the most oversaturated and has been done to death (pun intended). Every year zombie films come out and I'd say that around 95% of them are absolute crap. It's nice to see people taking a different approach whether it's comedy (SHAUN OF THE DEAD) or the transition to television (THE WALKING DEAD) but unless you bring something entirely new to the zombie film it will be quickly forgotten and thrown on top of the ever growing pile of shit.

To be honest there has only been one zombie movie in the last decade or so which I have actually enjoyed and that was the Ford brothers' THE DEAD from last year. Fortunately however I can now add EXIT HUMANITY to that very short list because it is fantastic.

Towards the end of the American Civil War there is a zombie outbreak which ravages the human population and two of its victims are the wife and son of Edward Young (Gibson). To fulfil a promise made before his son died, Edward starts on a journey to deliver his ashes to a place which holds special meaning to him. Along his way he meets up with a survivor Isaac (Seybold) who ropes him in to save his sister from the evil General Williams (Moseley) who is experimenting with humans to try and discover a cure for the zombie plague. After rescuing her, Isaac and Edward find a woman named Eve (Wallace) who holds a terrible secret. Edward finally delivers his son's ashes but comes back to find his friends kidnapped by Williams and so he formulates a plan to rescue them.

EXIT HUMANITY is told in the form of a journal which is narrated by Edward's descendant Malcolm Young (voiced by Brian Cox). Brian's voice is perfectly suited for this role and the narration is a nice accompaniment to the visuals. The movie is divided into chapters and interspersed within these chapters is another interesting addition in the form of short animations. 

The cinematography is good and the period setting is really well done, I can imagine only true Civil War enthusiasts would find problems with it. The acting is good with an exceptionally great performance by Mark Gibson in his first lead role. And when taking the small budget into consideration everything is better than you might expect, even the practical effects look nice.

EXIT HUMANITY might not be quite what you'd expect from a zombie film, and as a matter of fact the zombies take a back seat for most of the movie. They act more as a catalyst for the characters' actions rather than being the main focus. The pace is fairly slow but thankfully the running time is short enough for this to be too much of a problem. A nice fresh take on the zombie genre and well worth checking out.