At 28, Mikhail Red is at the height of his career. Imagine, he showed off his directing chops to the whole nation when he became a part of the 9th Cinemalaya Philippine Independent Film Festival at age 21, releasing his debut film under the “New Breed” category called Rekorder — a voyeuristic analysis of the new generation and the impact of technology in the progress (or lack thereof) of social action. Far from perfect, he proved to people that he is more than his family name, that he has a voice of his own, albeit far broader than his father who has cemented his name in the landscape of our national cinema. The young Red has become the epicenter of discussions from the local film community at age 25, when his films Birdshot and Neomanila have garnered massive critical reception. Who wouldn’t be impressed if someone as young as Mikhail is already capable of boasting arresting visuals and uncanny storytelling? Saying that he has peaked at such a young age would be unfair, especially when his “hunger to create” shows in every action and decision he has been making in his career. And while that is admirable, nothing changes the fact that his most recent released film — a complete three-sixty from the usual filmic style everyone has gotten used to in the past — is a regressive portrait of a director who has succumbed to style over substance, completely forgetting the essence of horror cinema.
Block Z follows the life of the students of San Lazaro University as they juggle their academics with usual adolescent antics. PJ (Julia Baretto) is a senior medical student from the aforementioned university, only a few steps away from graduating and getting her medical license. And so are her friends Lucas (Joshua Garcia), Erika (Maris Racal) and Myles (McCoy De Leon), who are also her classmates under the titular block. Out of nowhere, somehow looking for a reason to have the plot shift into the apocalyptic romp it wants to be, Angie (Ina Raymundo) enters the picture as a woman who has been bitten by some random creature. She dies inside the ward, only to be reborn as a zombie later on, causing panic and distress to the eventually locked-down university.
Contrary to popular belief, zombie cinema has never been centered on pure popcorn entertainment; in fact, the idea behind it is to reveal social illnesses and explore human identity in the midst of a sudden catastrophic breakout. Films like Night of the Living Dead, Re-Animator or even 28 Days Later vividly reflect on the post-human condition, making use of the fear and tension established on the background to ensue mass hysteria, small-scale paranoia and familial collapse. Right off the bat, Block Z makes it clear that the film doesn’t care about the characters nor the milieu… but “clear” is too much of an overstatement when the film doesn’t really know where it wants to go to. The story moves at a glacial pace, making use of irrelevant jump scares and canny choreography to make the running time become longer than usual, but never does it allow any of its plot points to simmer into a boil. Wishy-washy to an extreme fault, Block Z evidently meanders by adding layers and layers of plot distractions to somehow veer its audience away from its unclear route. 
Block Z shows the superficiality of young Red’s recent cinematic outings — from the near-sighted terror of Eerie, where its themes of religiosity and mental health awareness never see the light of day, to the one-dimensional critique of Dead Kids, where its skeleton of elitism and bourgeois privilege finds its bones disjointing. What are we supposed to get from watching this film? Is it about the importance of family and friendship, that no matter what is going on, no one dies or gets left behind? Is it about sacrifice and martyrdom for the sake of collective survival, that one’s sacrifice is a symbol of strength for those left behind? It was never made clear from the start. The film never dwelt on any of the following. Hoping for something (or anything at all) to latch on to in terms of its message and themes, the material falters. Completely. In effect, the film never truly makes sense as a whole.
Block Z has so much loose ends, from the storytelling to character development to world-building. And ironically, for a Mikhail Red film, it doesn’t have young Red’s distinct atmospheric tension that can leave its audience suffocating. The film can also be looked at as the least Mikhail Red film ever to have come out in the big screen. It’s quite suspicious, really. And in a way, the film reminds us of the existence of the 2014 regional zombie film Di Ingon Nato (Not Like Us). While Di Ingon Nato feels like an incomplete film through and through and although comparing the two films can be a crime since both are totally far from each other in terms of execution and storytelling, the regional film trumps this blockbuster, even with the meager budget and filming conditions it had at the time. 
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[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kYb9eAu27Vo]
Produced by ABS-CBN Star Cinema, Block Z is now showing in cinemas nationwide.
