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You know about Shaun. But do you know about Juan?
The oddest thing about the movie Juan of the Dead is that the pun of its title works far better in English than the original Spanish of “Juan de los Muertos“, especially when you consider that the international release of the original Dawn of the Dead used the title Zombi.
But this is unquestionably not only a Spanish-language film, it’s one that’s very much written from the “hometown” perspective of Cuban filmmaker Alejandro Brugués. In terms of social subtext, Juan of the Dead is definitely a spiritual descendant of Romero’s 1978 offering, but the culture of the setting is different, and thus the subtext follows. When the zombies start to rise, every official announcement makes certain to not only assure the public that the “dissidents” are being dealt with, but to end with condemnation of the United States and their imperialist aggressions. Mind you, there’s absolutely no hint in the movie the U.S. has anything to do with the undead plague, but that doesn’t seem to matter, and you get the sense the people listening mostly just treat it like the white noise it is. There’s not even much surprise at one moment of hilarious juxtaposition when the radio is declaring a return to normalcy even as another smoking building on the horizon collapses.
The “heroes” of the movie, such as they are, are on the one hand the familiar bunch of slackers common to most of the comedic zombie movies of the last decade, and on the other have a certain nihilistic, amoral practicality to them that seems again to be intended at least in part as a cultural commentary. In a communist land, one of their first decisions as the dead walk is to start up a business whose slogan is quite literally “We kill your loved ones”, a market niche even the most soulless Western capitalist might have hesitated to fill.
They’re organized to do it on maybe… day 3 of the impending apocalypse? You call them, you pay them, and they put grandma down so you don’t have to. Of course, the apocalypse seems like such a strangely gradual thing… the streets fill with zombies, more and more buildings burn on the skyline… but that doesn’t matter so much as squeezing a living from the opportunity, not to mention looting whatever they get their hands on. I don’t put “heroes” in scare quotes for nothing, these folks would dump a crippled man out of his wheelchair so they could use it to carry more tequila. When the fat comic relief character runs across a (still human) guy who owed him money, he takes a moment to butcher him with a machete, explains why, and everyone sort of nods, shrugs, and carries on. Rosa’s behavior so far in our comic seems positively saintly by comparison.
But if they seem morally bankrupt, I also got the sense that their situation living in the poorer sections of Havana portrayed them as not having far to fall. In fact, that may have been the whole point, that their daily lives were already such a wasteland that the zombie apocalypse required precious little adjustment. And yet, in the end, they make a brave choice you rarely see in one of these movies, a choice which again seemed very tied to cultural issues.
It’s an uneven film, and one that probably makes more sense to someone familiar with modern Cuba, but there’s enough enjoyable ideas and takes on old zombie tropes to entertain. Lest we forget, the original Dawn of the Dead had its kooky moments of nonsense as well, but people responded to that strong undercurrent of commentary on mindless American consumerism. Here we have a similar lens turned on Cuba, but also a protagonist in Juan who starts with nothing and ends with nothing, but always resolves to survive the best he can. As he says throughout the movie even in the midst of the most hopeless odds: “All I need is a chance.”
Juan of the Dead is currently available on Netflix Instant, so if you’re a zombie movie fan with access and 90 minutes to kill, well… give it a chance.