The genre of the undead flourishes again in the new trailer for Martin Owen’s The Loneliest Boy in the World, set to release in theaters on October 14th and drop on VOD platforms on October 18th. Billed as “a modern fairytale, except with zombies,” the dark comedy stars Max Harwood as Oliver, a timid teenager trying to find his way through suburban life after his mother passes.
The UK production is the sixth full-length feature for indie filmmaker Owen, whose previous films include L.A. Slasher, Let’s Be Evil, Killers Anonymous, The Intergalactic Adventures of Max Cloud, and Twist. For this “zombedy,” as some are calling it, Owen worked from a screenplay by Piers Ashworth, and the project re-united him with cinematographer Håvard Helle, who had shot his last several movies. Notably, the one recognizable name involved is Emilio Estevez, who executive-produced the film.
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In the opening seconds of the film’s trailer, we meet Harwood’s Oliver, in which our protagonist approaches a bare-chested, shades-wearing Hero Fiennes Tiffin lounging in a lawn chair on a gray, overcast day. Oliver’s inquiring about his sunglasses is met with the smug reply, “turns out I need them more than you do,” and the reveal that the shades are hiding his blackened, cratered dead eyes. Yes, Tiffin, whose character is credited as Mitch, is a zombie, but a talking, aware one, so the undead aren’t like the walkers in The Walking Dead or many of the other shows and movies in the wide genre.
As we are taken indoors to see Oliver bandaging the head of his corpse-lish companion, we hear him ask, “You know, you could’ve been caught; what would you have done?” to which we get the plucky reply: “Play dead.”
A raspy voice-over fills us in on Oliver’s loneliness and former lack of friends, while quick cuts fill in his backstory. Imagery flashes by of him being taunted by bullies (“You’re a freak!” taunts an angry teen in a park), coming to a catharsis at a cemetery, and digging up various bodies and arranging them like a family on a couch poised for a photographic portrait punctuated by the announcer’s tag-line, “But Oliver is about to discover that family never dies.” Basically, Oliver has taken the initiative in his life to dig up some friends.
The Plot and the Blood Thickens
Well Go USA Entertainment
The next series of shots and cuts take us through both the supporting cast and examples of the film’s quirky, macabre humor. Susan Wokoma appears to have a stand-out role as Oliver’s maid, Tallulah Haddon, appears as a possible love interest. We see zombie friends such as Evan Ross, Hammed Animashaun, Ben Miller, and Jacob Sartorius living it up in party and diner scenes. We also get more of Tiffin as Oliver’s friend Mitch, indicating a thread throughout the film about their friendship.
There’s also some edge presented in the form of some possibly sketchy types like a dapper Nicholas Stone, credited as Bruce observing to Ashley Benson, in a role that has no name credited on IMDb yet, “there’s something very strange happening in that house – they’re making us look like fools.”
The budding romance between Harwood and Haddon also features through the quick cut clips with a cute car seat moment quoted: “I may be dead, Oliver, but I’m not stupid.”
One thing the trailer isn’t clear on is where the film is set. From the seaside cliff, the look of the architecture, and, of course, the accents, it’s obviously a UK production, but info on the shooting locations or any production notes are hard to come by at this early stage in the film’s existence.
The Bottom Line Bathos
The trailer ends with a button involving Oliver, his sister, Mel, played by Zenobia Williams, and Wokoma’s maid character, Susanne. Mel is trying to wake up her brother, Oliver, with a plucky “Get out of bed, you sleepy head,” but she falls off the bed out of the shot. Susanne is immediately at the doorway, asking, “What happened here?” Oliver responds that she just fell off the bed as her disembodied head is held in his hand, cradled in his arm.
That sight gag punctuating the trailer puts a stamp on the quirky, playfully dark humor that The Loneliest Boy in the World is primed to serve up. The triumphant music surrounding the montage of shots that wrap up the preview broadcasts that the film has feel-good intentions and most likely won’t be a downer.
The evidence presented by the trailer for this fairytale concerning the undead as companions for a lonely boy telegraphs a tone and a stylistic approach recalling Wes Anderson, Tim Burton, and Edgar Wright. A sentimentality that’s equal measures of cynicism, and silliness, packaged with artfully engaging yet everyday details, can be felt through the entirety of the trailer’s two minutes and 30 seconds.
Mid-October, audiences will find out if director Owen’s The Loneliest Boy in the World will live up to its billing as “A satire and a celebration of family values, of the imagery of horror films, of suburban life, of the American Dream and of the ultimate taboo; death.” Its charmingly edgy trailer certainly makes the case that the movie is going to pull it off.
