'We Bury The Dead' (2025) Movie Review

It doesn’t feel entirely accurate to call writer/director Zak Hilditch’s We Bury the Dead a zombie movie, which is how it’s been marketed. At the same time, however, it’s difficult to talk about without mentioning the Z-word. There are undead to be found, though not the swarming, apocalyptic, flesh-hungry variety, nor are they the film’s focus. They exist in this narrative as the impetus, as part of the inciting event to get the ball rolling; they’re presence is unsettling, yes, but not often as dangerous as anticipated.

 

The U.S. military sets off an experimental weapon and, big oopsie, it zaps and kills damn near everyone in Tasmania. American Ava (Daisy Ridley, Star Wars: The Force Awakens) volunteers for the massive corpse clean up in hopes of finding her husband, who was there on business when things went bad. Ava’s quest pushes her to abandon her post and venture deep into a quarantine zone accompanied by Clay (Brenton Thwaites, Gods of Egypt), a vulgar roughneck she meets doing body disposal.

 

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Here’s the rub, the dead don’t always stay that way. What appears to be a negligible number of the victims rise and reanimate, though they don’t really do much but stand around and look sad. At least initially, they pose no immediate threat other than the moral question of whether shooting them in the head, as the military does, is the right course of action. We learn as the movie goes on that the longer the undead are left unattended, the more feral and traditionally zombie-like they become, though this is only a minor issue once or twice throughout.

 

More than constantly dodging shambling corpses looking for a snack, We Bury the Dead is Ava’s meditative, Heart of Darkness-style journey deeper into the remote wastes and into her own psyche. Dreamy flashbacks and hazy memories unfurl and what we understand her mission to be changes and evolves, winding up in a less expected place. Is she just that dedicated a spouse, does she hope to find her hubby alive, is she looking for closure, is there something more? The script cleverly shifts expectations and aims, and with it what we believe her motivations to be. 

 

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Ridley is as good as she’s ever been here and carries a movie that is mostly her by herself, alone with her demons. Ava’s full of guilt, remorse, love, and a complex cocktail of emotions, and Ridley brings all that interiority to the surface. Thwaites comes and goes from the film as is convenient for the plot, and he does a solid job as the crass hunk who may be more kind, damaged, and good-hearted than his surface lets on. Outside of those two, the only other character of any significance is Riley (Mark Coles Smith), a grief-stricken soldier who reminds Ava that other people are still the most significant danger she faces. (Other roles primarily have names like Camper Van Dad, Farm Girl, and Ava’s First Partner.)

 

Working with director of photography Steve Annis (The Crow, Color Out of Space), Hilditch delivers a nice looking, well put together film. They make ample use of the gorgeous Tasmanian coastlines and stunning natural vistas. As Ava and Clay delve deeper into the cordoned off area, roiling columns of smoke and red-tinged skies further add to the apocalyptic, uncanny, borderline-hallucinatory sensation of their voyage.

 

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We Bury the Dead has a unique, inventive premise that tweaks and subverts the well-worn beats and expectations of the zombie genre, using that framework to explore a character’s rich, complex emotional world. Personally, I enjoy what it does and how it does it. I find it rewarding and moving, but I also recognize it’s not for everyone. I’ve talked to people who find it slow or disappointing, who want more traditional zombie action. If that’s what you’re after, and I don’t believe that’s what Hilditch is doing, this may not be the movie for you. But you, like me, may find the quiet, sparse horror drama quite lovely. [Grade: B]