Juan of the Dead

Written and directed by Alejandro Brugués, this horror comedy is not only one of the better zombie movies in recent memory, but has the added value of being a sharp political commentary about life in Cuba, a country that few Americans know anything about. The film stars Alexis Díaz de Villegas as Juan, a man who tries very hard to do as little as possible to survive day-to-day. While out fishing with his equally lazy friend Lazaro (Jorge Milina), Juan lands what turns out to be the rotting corpse of a zombie. Rather than panic, or see it as a warning of things to come, the pair kills the undead thing and sinks him back into the ocean, vowing to never tell anybody what they saw. It isn’t long before their silence is senseless because Havana is soon overrun with zombies, all of whom seem determined to eat Juan and his friends. The film is fierce and funny, usually in the same scene, and the actors do a great job of selling the scares. It is the running commentary of the film about Cuba and its people, however, that gives Juan of the Dead its true power.