At the start of 2025, the documentary Eternal You from co-directors Hans Block and Moritz Riesewieck released on digital and VOD. The feature sought to explore the ways in which companies are developing artificial intelligence to participate in the grieving process. Between listening to programmers, developers, and a few users, the filmmakers also brought in experts to discuss the psychology of grieving and the significance of it to humanity at large. Being able to process one’s grief, to allow it to move forward (not necessarily to let go), empowers an individual to accept the loss and continue living, whereas the use of A.I. (in this writer’s opinion) only serves to prevent a person from reaching acceptance. This is, to a great degree, what powers the horror thriller We Bury the Dead, the latest project from Rattlesnake (2019) writer/director Zak Hilditch. Faced with a terrible and sudden tragedy, the film asks what lengths someone might go to in order to remove all hope and achieve closure. While not as profound or conclusive as one may like, We Bury the Dead is, nevertheless, a surprisingly moving experience that reframes the zombie film into a different sort of horror story.
Daisy Ridley as Ava in WE BURY THE DEAD. Photo Credit: Finlay MacKay. Photo courtesy of Vertical Entertainment.
When a U.S. military test goes wrong off the coast of Tasmania, over 500,000 die instantly, making it a mass casualty event and an international incident. In the wake of it, a clean-up and restoration process begins, welcoming volunteers from countries near and far. One such volunteer is Ava (Daisy Ridley), a physical therapist from the U.S., who, like many, sees volunteering as a way to give back, but also sees it as a chance to confirm if her husband, Mitch (Matt Whelan), is among the dead. Like the rest of the volunteers, she’s shocked and horrified to learn that the military discovered that some of the victims reanimate, moving slowly and without any sense of awareness; however, it also fills her with a hope that Mitch may be one of them. Determined to reach his last known destination, Ava finds herself going through proverbial hell just to achieve some kind of closure.
Daisy Ridley as Ava in WE BURY THE DEAD. Photo Credit: Nic Duncan. Photo courtesy of Vertical Entertainment.
If one is looking for a comparison to help set expectations, the most recent title is Henry Hobson’s Maggie (2015), a horror drama featuring Arnold Schwarzenegger (Twins) and Abigail Breslin (Ender’s Game) as a father-daughter pair dealing with her infection and final steps. Here, Hilditch uses the concept of a zombie outbreak quite differently, the threat of infection unmentioned and, potentially, not possible, but, most certainly, unimportant to the narrative and its intentions. Hilditch provides theories without scientific support through notions the characters share, relying on character interpretation as nothing is stated as definitive within the film itself, similar to Night of the Living Dead (1968), 28 Days Later (2002), and Anna and the Apocalypse (2017). One can read whatever they like into something and, in the throes of grief, trying to find meaning or reasoning is at the top of the list and prescribing significance to the chaos. Audiences follow Ava as she tries to do exactly this as she puts a pause on her physical therapy practice and journeys to Tasmania to retrieve bodies and help identify the reanimated so that they can be addressed by the military. For her, joining the retrieval team is a means to an end, one which helps her gain clearance to the country before trying to navigate it, alone if she must, to get to the resort Mitch was visiting on a business trip. Her grief, her unfinished business, drives her to find Mitch, to identify him, to ensure that the knowledge of his death is concrete and without bartering. There are moments of the expected within the film — some zombies growing violent, some brushes with danger — but that’s not what We Bury the Dead is. It’s not about survival. It’s about closure and how, living or dead, it can push people to do unimaginable things.
L-R: Daisy Ridley as Ava and Brenton Thwaites as Clay in WE BURY THE DEAD. Photo courtesy of Vertical Entertainment.
It’s to that end that, in order to keep things spoiler-free, we’ll explore the film as a representation of the Kübler-Ross Model. While Kübler-Ross isn’t entirely scientific or fully-proven, often seen as pop psychology, it can be useful for individuals coming to terms with loss. Returning to Eternal You for a moment, one of the experts in the documentary states that the act of grieving, of laying someone to rest, has been a part of the process of death and dying for centuries and is part of the way we, as individuals and as a community, say goodbye. It makes things real and allows individuals to accept the new reality of life continuing without an individual. This is, essentially, what drives Ava, albeit with more going on than Hilditch hints at in the trailer. Her journey, her obstacles, are all part of the grieving process with physical manifestations of the stages being things she must go through in order to reach her character’s targeted goal. Moving from denial to acceptance isn’t her specified intention, but the journey forces her to do exactly that, much of which Ridley does in silence, requiring the performer to convey so much physically when words would be odd within the context of the specific situation or moment. Even when the script hits specific beats that almost all zombie stories incorporate to raise tension and threats, to conjure an enemy to battle and overcome, they still manage to correlate to a stage naturally. The element that speaks to Bargaining and Depression is a particularly unsurprising one in its inclusion, whereas the incorporation of it and actor performance makes it powerful in its desperation.
Daisy Ridley as Ava in WE BURY THE DEAD. Photo Credit: Nic Duncan. Photo courtesy of Vertical Entertainment.
Because it’s a zombie film, let’s talk about the zeds. There’s nothing particular remarkable about the makeup or character design, each looking as one might for a zombie. The wounded move unflinchingly with the slow shuffle while the fast run; each go after someone for reasons that are unclear, yet unimportant. What is positively unsettling is the convergence of sound design and prosthetics which will, well, fucking unsettle you as Hilditch’s zombies find themselves mostly grinding their teeth, their jaws clicking and teeth buckling under duress. The act of unaware self-harm elicits greater tension than any foaming beast might as it feels like a wind-up to greater violence, whether it occurs or not. The possibility of what it means (or could mean) is enough to put anyone on edge, regardless of whether they are in the film or the audience.
Daisy Ridley as Ava in WE BURY THE DEAD. Photo Credit: Nic Duncan. Photo courtesy of Vertical Entertainment.
We bury the dead to say goodbye. It’s an act that’s meant to signify the permanence of their physical transition and offer a chance for the survivors to let go. It doesn’t matter if burial means entombment, cremation, burning at sea, or something even more non-traditional — we bury the dead to accept that they’re gone. It doesn’t mean that everything we want to say gets said, everything we want to do gets done, as the vacancy left behind, the shape of that person, may never truly be resolved. But we maintain these traditions so that we each have a chance to heal, even if that means tending to scars for the remainder of our own time. In this way, while certain elements of Hilditch’s film aren’t particularly revelatory, its approach and intention within the zombie horror film space are, nevertheless, profoundly affecting.
In select theaters January 2nd, 2026.
For more information, head to the official Campfire Studios We Bury the Dead webpage.
Final Score: 3.5 out of 5.
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Categories: In Theaters, Reviews
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