Zombies are way overrated, and I don't get the cultural obsession with them over the last 10 years , pushing aside the classic ghosts and vampires. So when a Canadian zombie movie went to TIFF, start salivating! The Toronto festival awarded it Best Canadian Film seemingly just for showing up. Billed as a fresh reinvention of the zombie genre with loads of political allegory, Ravenous gives us zombies who can run rather than slowly saunter, but really nothing else original.
The cheapness of the production shows through over and over again. Anyone can shoot people walking through a grass field on a shoestring budget, with zombies who are just people wearing the most minimal makeup. The odd gory special effect doesn't add much to the impression the film makes as a technical achievement. At best, some sequences are entertaining in their action. As an allegory, though, there's nothing here, and no message. Like the genre itself, Ravenous ends up overrated.