I appreciate ambition. I love ambition. It’s an admirable quality, especially in the possession of storytellers and filmmakers. Sadly, ambition doesn’t always equate quality, and that’s the problem with “We Are What We Eat.” It’s ambitious, sure, but it’s not exactly the greatest short zombie film I’ve ever seen.
In fact the overall premise is confusing unless you give it some strong thought. From what I can tell “We Are What We Eat” has the wise motive to be a cerebral zombie film in the final scene, but much of it doesn’t make too much sense, nor does it explain if this is merely the beginning of a zombie apocalypse and our main character Nicole is merely having a fever dream, or if the zombie bite Nicole endures gives her psychic powers and we see what is going to happen.
And it’s never fully explained what the zombie apocalypse is, where it started, how it started, and if it’s already happening. All we get is Nicole talking to her boyfriend in class as he explains that he’s been feeling very sick and little else. “We Are What We Eat” has good intentions but overall it’s not much of a story. The editing is also lacking as when Nicole is actually attacked, the director quickly cuts away to a sloppy shot of Nicole walking away from the woods with a bloody wood stump.
We then veer in to the well shot but pretty cliché scenes of zombie carnage, followed by an ending that’s either meant as a surprise or a question mark. I could never tell. It has ambition, it has good intentions, but that doesn’t make for an entirely entertaining film. I appreciate it when first time directors take a stab at a larger premise, but “We Are What We Eat” needs a lot of work, in the end. That’s what ultimately keeps it from being anything but mediocre.