We Bury The Dead, written and directed by Zak Hilditch, is not your typical zombie apocalypse movie. The rules of this world and these creatures are fresh and new, with both characters and audience alike unsure of what to expect. After a catastrophic military disaster, the dead don’t just rise – they hunt. The military insists they are harmless and slow-moving, offering hope to grieving families. But when Ava (Daisy Ridley) enters a quarantine zone searching for her missing husband, she uncovers the horrifying truth: the undead are growing more violent, more relentless, and more dangerous with every passing hour. On her journey, she meets Clay (Brenton Thwaites) and Riley (Mark Coles Smith), both people who were affected by the military disaster in different ways.

The film’s concept of the zombies, which it referred to as the undead, was extremely interesting. They are unlike the usual zombie in media. When Ava first arrives, they can barely move and are not a real threat. But as the film progresses, their movement increases, and they get scarier. One of the things that makes this film’s zombies different from the rest is the question raised about intelligence. The undead in this world seem as though they are not just mindless creatures that roam around, compared to something like The Walking Dead. They have an awareness, and that in and of itself is what makes this thriller all the more suspenseful and tense.

The sound was another element that made this film fit its genre as a thriller. The undead make this noise of grinding their teeth that makes you want to cover your ears, but you also can not look away because you are so fascinated by why they are doing that. It was reminiscent of one of the great horror films of 2025, Bring Her Back. That film used sound to heighten the intense moments that happen throughout, and We Bury The Dead takes the same approach by elevating the sound when the undead appear. My only gripe is that we do not see the undead enough. And with the amount of differences the undead have compared to zombies in other media, it would have been nice to see that explored more.

Daisy Ridley is excellent as Ava. She does an excellent job of showing the look of being frozen in fear, while simultaneously having to fight for her life and survive. Her path is simple (in theory): reach the hotel where her husband was staying, and make it to him. Ava maintains that determination throughout the entire film, and that is where Ridley shines the most in her performance. There’s also a sense of grief in her performance, as it is likely her husband is dead, but she can not fully grieve him until she can get personal confirmation. Whenever she finds herself grieving, she snaps herself out of it, reminding herself and the audience of her resolve to find him and see him again. Brenton Thwaites as Clay is a great, carefree, rule-breaking opposite to Ridley’s seriousness and sternness as Ava. He brings a bit of silliness to some of the serious moments that ease the tension without distracting or taking away from those tense moments. He is not necessarily a good or bad guy; he’s just a guy, but that is what makes his decisions so interesting.

Rating: 3 out of 5 stars

This film’s concept of the undead and zombies was its most interesting aspect, and they are not in the film nearly enough. The film stresses that the undead are progressively getting worse, but I do not think there is a full progression shown of how the zombies move and react. If we had more time with the undead and got to see a full progression of their transformation into full-blown zombies, this film could have gone from good to great.