Horror Chick, With Melissa Lafsky: See 'Zombieland' Or I Will Eat Your Brain

Vampires are still so in right now. They're like the peephole platform heel of the horror world. Everywhere you turn, they're frolicking in orgy-prone Cajun towns or masquerading as brooding (read: constipated) adolescents who awe their high school classmates and destroy feminism. Good times. But want to know what's a far better time? Zombies. (No spoilers ahead.)

Zombies aren't trying to bone you or rescue you or captivate your soul with their pulsating manly man-ness and spackled hair. They don't give a rat's ass about overblown social metaphors or moral relativism or charming your undies off at least once an episode. They just want to eat you. Preferably your guts, if it's Raimi or Romero. Or your brains, if it's Return of the Living Dead. They'll munch your bones and slurp your innards and then go about their zombie way. They're the perfect predictable date. Plus they're funny. Vampires: not funny. Maybe it's the lack of fiber.

This is why you should burn all the vampire shlockfests in your bookshelf and erase the vampire orgies from your DVR and go see Zombieland instead. From the opening credits, it tells you exactly what it is—hysterically funny. Sean of the Dead-meets-Deliverance funny. When you have a mentally-disabled child zombie eating a soccer mom in your opening sequence, you know shit's gonna be amazing. There will be irreverence. There will be post-apocalyptic hilarity. We will have campy trailer-park flair plus the neurotic mensch from Squid and the Whale—add Woody Harrelson with a Hummer full of guns, and you've got a joy trifecta.

There's little NOT to love about this film. Van Halen and Beethoven on the soundtrack, stripper zombies chasing dollar-waving johns, the standard Romero-esque digs at capitalism. And, as would be expected from a big-studio project, the creature effects are kickass (with apologies to Homer Simpson, I like my beer cold, my TV loud, and my zombies oozing black goo). And yeah, there's the Double Secret Probation Cameo that you've no doubt already read about on 400 blogs (and if you haven't, there are 30,000 more Google results waiting to tell you, plus the whole damn movie is probably already download-able on 66Stage). But you won't find any spoilers here. I'm not gonna have cameo-spoiling on my conscience, along with pushing that 5-year-old out of the way for the last free sample at Fat Witch. I will say that for once the bloggers are right—said cameo is as brilliant as everyone says. It's on par with Bowie in Zoolander. Or Ethel Merman in Airplane. Only better. So much better.

My one criticism (there's gotta be one) was that the girl characters blew. Yes, preadolescent Little Miss Sunshine is adorability in a jar, and I realize I need to get over the fact that the Superbad chick manages to keep her eyeliner perfect in the middle of a zombie apocalypse. But in movies, when apparently self-reliant women go and do something stupendously retarded, just to set up a big fat Male Rescue, well, that shit's annoying. Girls do not go from smart to dumb in the space of an hour. Well, OK, maybe when there's dudes and sperm and tequila involved. Let me rephrase: When there are flesh-eating zombies poised to rip open our spleens, girls do not go from smart to dumb in the space of an hour.

Still, when Woody Harrelson tells a 300-pound zombie with entrail stains on his shirt, "You've got a purdy mouth," all is forgiven.

Melissa Lafsky really likes horror movies.