The Crazies movie review

Here's what you need to know; Sheriff Dutten has started to notice odd behaviour in the citizens of Ogden Marsh, a peaceful little town in the farmlands of Iowa. Little does he know that his happy little town is about to descend into madness as a leaked bio weapon turns it's friendly inhabitants into murderous psychopaths. Now him, his wife and his deputy must contend with the infected and the merciless government forces in an attempt to escape the doomed town.

At first glance this is a very standard outbreak movie, but that may just be it's greatest strength. As ever we'll start with the characters. Dutten is pretty cool, he's exactly the guy I'd want to go to hell with, because he's smart, in fact maybe he catches onto what's going on a little fast, but he really is smart, he's the man with the plan. That said, there isn't really a stupid character in this film, apart from the townsfolk, who are really just there to be infected anyway. His wife's pretty cool, like him she's smart. But then there's the deputy, who is my favourite character in the film for 1 reason, a reason that I'm not going to spoil, I'll just say he had a really great moment in the film. Like I said though they're really the guys you are stuck with for the film, they do meet people along the way but they're just the townsfolk. The film does however set up this town very well, it's a very friendly looking town, an everyone knows everyone farming town. This film also does a great job of setting up the fall too, from the very beginning the film has a very creepy mood about it, one that reaches a few peaks with some really tense moments with the crazies. But, while there are jump scares, this film is smarter than simple jump scares, a few times a character would be in frame, then the camera would slowly pan and a crazy would be there, just in the background not doing anything, staring at the character while  they are completely unaware. Similar to the last film I reviewed, this film also has a good bit of paranoia, as people in the group start to distrust one another, and it makes for one of the best scenes in the film, if not the best. But this film isn't just a zombie film, the crazies are a bit different, it's a fun and creative take on the zombie virus that I really like. This is a very realistic film, the army doesn't exactly drag it's feet in containing the virus, and to an extent for most of the film they're a greater threat than the crazies. But even then there are a few really good scenes, one in particular in a barn that's pretty tense. And, no spoilers, but this film doesn't shy away from the showing how far the government will go to cover up it's fuck up, and it's pretty brutal. Maybe to some people however this film's admittedly low amount of originality might be a bit of a turn off, believe me, it's a very predictable movie for the most part, no surprises or twists here. But why I'm personally fine with it is because of how well it's done, it's a very high end version of the outbreak movie, and like I say, even when you've seen those elements in dozens of films before, that doesn't change how effective this film is over all.

I really enjoyed The Crazies, yes it's a very unoriginal movie, and it doesn't really do anything unique, but what it does it does really well, and the whole film just comes together in a way that's still fun to watch even though you've definitely seen it before. Throw in some fun characters and a lovably creepy tone and you have a great little outbreak movie that's better than most, and that's definitely worth watching.