In a post-apocalyptic world, a virus has transformed humans into violently deranged cannibals. A bereaved mother has lost everything and takes refuge in an isolated mountain cabin, until a desperate wounded stranger arrives with a story of hope.
A story of redemption in a world gone dark.
Grimmfest Says: At heart, an old school Western, but with added zombies, Jordana Stott’s visually striking and emotionally powerful tale of hope and redemption is not ashamed to draw heavily on some of the most well-established, tried and tested tropes of the classic Oater. The rancher’s widow and her grizzled father in law coping with the loss of the rest of their family, protecting their isolated, run-down property from marauding outsiders (in this case, the feral zombie “Howlers”, rather than Apache war parties); the arrival of an injured man, with a band of vicious mercenaries in hot pursuit… The stage seems set for a post-apocalyptic rural outback reimagining of RIO BRAVO, and the film certainly sets up and toys with that classic siege confrontation situation, only to wrong-foot the viewer with a bleak, downbeat, but unexpectedly elegaic final act. The strong cast, headed by Lily Sullivan (EVIL DEAD RISE), Richard Roxburgh (VAN HELSING) and the great Aussie character actor Callum Mulvey, bring subtly and nuance and are clearly revelling in the droll and understated dialogue, the zombies are impressively terrifying when they do eventually appear, and the film looks stunning, with truly beautiful cinematography, a fine eye for location and landscape, and a sense of sheer scale that is rare in contemporary cinema.