‘Herd’ Review: A Solemn New Entry into Zombie Canon
Considering the long, sweeping history of the zombie genre, there should be a distinction between the undead and the infected. To be accepted as a bona fide addition to zombie lore, the Z in question moves slowly due to the effects of rigor mortis and the official Romero rules must be in place. If the characteristics attributed to becoming a ghoul are caused by some kind of virus, then it’s a horror movie about a group of infected. There also tends to be much more gore in a straight-up zombie movie and a little more social commentary and government conspiracy in an infected movie. Herd seems to understand this from the get-go, delivering a somber account of a deadly outbreak that’s more centered around character than calamity.
There isn’t any meta-commentary present, but writer-director Steven Pierce and co-writer James Allerdyce are well aware of the plethora of zombie apocalypses that have come before. So, instead of attempting to outdo or even match the flesh-ripping practical effects from yesteryear, they made a film that’s firmly situated in the infected category. In the place of all that biting and screaming we’re all generally accustomed to, Herd focuses on the breakdown of human dynamics as rural America deals with a sudden, fast-moving outbreak. Striking another familiar chord, it’s the people you really have to worry about, not the poor souls that caught “the bug” as it’s referred to in the film.
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Unfortunately, Herd relies way too heavily on a family drama and the formulaic interplay between two emerging local militias to ever gain any momentum. Speaking of family, the first character introduced is an aging father, Robert Miller (Corben Bernsen), who fends off a lumbering attacker and warns his neighbors that something strange is definitely going on. His estranged daughter Jamie (Ellen Adair) is introduced next embarking on a canoe trip with her wife Alex (Mitzi Akaha) in hopes of patching up a rocky relationship. The river is near Jamie’s old neck of the woods, which brings back her long-standing Dad issues.
In a predictable fashion, Alex is badly injured during the excursion and they both begin the trek back to some form of civilization for help. They find respite with some locals at a makeshift compound run by Big John (Jeremy Holm). They are stocking up to face the dual threat of the infected and another militant group led by Sterling (Timothy V. Murphy), who turns out to be the real villain in Herd. Thanks to a powerful performance by Holm, who genre fans will remember from The Ranger and this year’s Brooklyn 45, there’s just enough emotional heft to hold things together. For a spell.
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There’s too much attention paid to the negative effects of groupthink as the story inches forward, though. Jamie and Alex are caught in the middle of an outbreak and a haphazard military operation, all while trying to conceal the fact that they’re a couple and not just hiking buddies. That does provide a little bit of tension. As they all try and wait out the virus, Jamie’s Dad comes back into the picture and a pretty dour family history slowly comes into focus. After a while, Jamie’s histrionic monologuing coupled with a lot of humdrum doomsday prep begins to recall some of the drawn-out, melancholic episodes that The Walking Dead fell victim to in later seasons.
The Z-word, if I’m remembering correctly, is never uttered. Nor are other descriptors like walkers, chompers, biters, groaners, etc. If Herd was really about a horde of zombies, it would be going under a different title altogether. The outbreak is just an excuse to explore what happens when human beings are suddenly thrown into a pressure cooker. What Herd does manage to do effectively is tap into a running theme in zombie movies where the people you end up with are nothing like you at all. Pierce’s film chooses to make the characters more three-dimensional and relatable. In theory, that should make them more interesting. For some, that may prove to be the case.
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As for the infected themselves, the bubbling, puss-filled makeup effects by Caitlin Young and crew are just gross enough to cause your recoil instinct to kick in. They appear in short bursts, usually alone, without any dormant desire to congregate with each other as they did in their past lives. That’s an interesting detail, actually. The humans band together immediately, and the infected roam around by themselves. We’re the herd, not the other way around.
Herd is in theaters and on digital/VOD on October 13, 2023.
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Herd
Summary
Herd is one movie where you should definitely pay very close attention to the title. Here, the virus is never seen as the real threat, we are.
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