World War Z
Paramount Pictures | Release Date: June 21, 2013 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
63
METASCORE
Generally favorable reviews based on 46 Critic Reviews
Positive:
30
Mixed:
14
Negative:
2
Watch Now
Stream On
Stream On
Stream On
Buy on
Stream On
Stream On
Stream On
Stream On
Stream On
Stream On
Stream On
Stream On
Expand

Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
91
Tampa Bay TimesSteve PersallJun 20, 2013
World War Z presents an abundance of relatively plausible action, smart solutions and one useful piece of information: When the zombiepocalypse comes, the undead are flying coach. Read full review
91
Entertainment WeeklyOwen GleibermanJun 19, 2013
It's scary good fun. Read full review
88
Chicago Sun-TimesRichard RoeperJun 19, 2013
It’s entertaining as hell. Read full review
88
ObserverRex ReedJun 18, 2013
World War Z towers above every other alleged summer blockbuster. It’s the real deal. Read full review
83
Portland OregonianMarc MohanJun 20, 2013
World War Z manages to be scary without descending to in-your-face gore -- it wants to frighten its audience, not disgust them. Read full review
80
The New YorkerDavid DenbyJun 29, 2013
World War Z is the most gratifying action spectacle in years, and one reason for its success if the Pitt doesn't play a superhero. [1 July 2013, p.76]
78
Film.comWilliam GossJun 8, 2013
An efficient and effectively exciting globe-spanning zombie thriller. Read full review
75
The Globe and Mail (Toronto)Liam LaceyJun 20, 2013
Leave it to Brad Pitt, producer and star of World War Z, to try to put the zip back in zombie. Read full review
75
Philadelphia InquirerSteven ReaJun 20, 2013
Forster and his team have also mastered the discreet edit, leaving a lot of the blood, gore, and zombie slime to the imagination. (It's still a pretty convincingly creepy affair.) Read full review
75
Rolling StonePeter TraversJun 20, 2013
World War Z is still as smart, shifty and scary as a starving zombie ready to chow down on you, baby, you. Read full review
75
San Francisco ChronicleMick LaSalleJun 20, 2013
Exciting, truly harrowing and smartly directed apocalyptic thriller from Marc Forster ("Monster's Ball"). It's the scariest zombie movie in many years.
75
St. Louis Post-DispatchJoe WilliamsJun 20, 2013
World War Z, based on a novel by Max Brooks and directed by Marc Forster ("Quantum of Solace"), has a relatively plausible perspective on mass catastrophe. It deserves comparisons to Steven Soderbergh’s brainy “Contagion.” Read full review
75
Boston GlobeTy BurrJun 19, 2013
World War Z is epically realized entertainment that feeds on our fears of apocalypse, but it’s just fast enough and smart enough — and, more importantly, human enough — to keep an audience on edge from start to finish. Read full review
75
McClatchy-Tribune News ServiceRoger MooreJun 18, 2013
The first 25 minutes or so of this “Contagion” meets “28 Days Later” thriller will leave you breathless. And the rest of it serves up novel and often entertaining solutions to the various “zombie problems” that this over-exposed genre presents. Read full review
70
SlateDana StevensJun 21, 2013
Given how efficiently World War Z has delivered jolts and screams over the course of its sleek 116-minute running time, it’s easy to forgive this rushed and slightly muted finale. Read full review
70
NPRBob MondelloJun 21, 2013
The movie has made it to theaters not dead on arrival, but walking dead, running dead, and — when it's really working — swarming dead. Read full review
70
The New York TimesA.O. ScottJun 20, 2013
World War Z often feels smaller and quieter than it is, because your attention is drawn to details and moments rather than to showstopping spectacles or self-important themes. Read full review
70
Los Angeles TimesKenneth TuranJun 20, 2013
It's fun to see this kind of familiar material done with intelligence and skill. Read full review
70
Wall Street JournalJoe MorgensternJun 20, 2013
This enjoyable shambles of a sci-fi thriller, directed by Marc Forster in impressive 3-D, stands on its own as a powerful vision of planetary chaos. Read full review
70
SalonAndrew O'HehirJun 20, 2013
A genuinely exciting thrill ride that only occasionally feels bloated or painfully dumb. Read full review
70
TimeRichard CorlissJun 18, 2013
Here’s the oddest element in this tale of Hollywood fine-tuning run rampant: the movie is pretty good — the summer’s most urgent, highest-IQ action picture. Read full review
70
Village VoiceStephanie ZacharekJun 17, 2013
Forster's meticulousness—coupled with ample excuses to blow stuff up—isn't enough to turn World War Z into one of those class-A end-of-everything movies that leaves you feeling just a little bit queasy, momentarily uncertain of your own small place in this unmanageable world. Read full review
70
VarietyScott FoundasJun 4, 2013
Emerges as a surprisingly smart, gripping and imaginative addition to the zombie-movie canon, owing as much to scientific disaster movies like “The China Syndrome” and “Contagion” as it does to undead ur-texts like the collected works of George Romero. Read full review
67
Christian Science MonitorPeter RainerJun 21, 2013
Director Marc Forster is very good at amping up the terror, but after a while, we reach zombie overload and we might as well be watching an infestation of Transformers. Read full review
67
Austin ChronicleMarjorie BaumgartenJun 19, 2013
World War Z comes across as a smart and ambitious horror movie, a bio-disaster film along the lines of "Contagion" or "28 Days Later." It’s nail-bitingly tense at times, although these well-executed moments mix with others that are too much of a murky jumble to follow with any precision. Read full review
67
IndieWireEric KohnJun 18, 2013
World War Z may wear its intellect proudly, but also consciously translates the zombie premise into a safer context for wider audiences. It's not the smartest zombie movie ever made, but might be the most commercial one. Read full review
63
Washington PostAnn HornadayJun 20, 2013
The result is a movie that, while no classic, can be credited with giving the audience something a bit more substantive than the usual disposable summer fare. Read full review
63
ReelViewsJames BerardinelliJun 20, 2013
The screenplay feels like the culmination of all sorts of things being thrown against a wall to see what sticks. As it turns out, there's not enough. Read full review
63
Chicago TribuneMichael PhillipsJun 20, 2013
The stakes are high and the excitement's there and the results, as previously stated, are messy but fairly entertaining. Read full review
63
USA TodayClaudia PuigJun 20, 2013
Essentially, it boils down to familiar fare: a well-paced, entertaining, conventional action thriller where a reluctant hero saves the day. Read full review
60
Arizona RepublicBill GoodykoontzJun 19, 2013
Even as big-budget blockbusters go, this is a hard movie to connect with. Read full review
60
Time OutDavid FearJun 18, 2013
Go big or go home, they say; World War Z picks the wrong choice for its slow fade-out, and, instead of leaving you in fear of being chomped upon as you exit the theater, makes you feel enraged that you’ve been more than a little cheated. Read full review
60
Time Out LondonCath ClarkeJun 15, 2013
The result looks less like a horror flick and more like a thinking man’s action-thriller – the ‘Newsnight’ of zombie films (you’ll know if that’s your cup of tea). Read full review
60
The GuardianHenry BarnesJun 7, 2013
While some of World War Z is rotten, the whole stands as a punchy, if conventional action thriller. Read full review
60
The Hollywood ReporterTodd McCarthyJun 4, 2013
Brad Pitt delivers a capable performance in an immersive apocalyptic spectacle about a global zombie uprising. Read full review
60
Total FilmPaul BradshawJun 3, 2013
Choosing quantity over quality, intensity over tension and big-screen thrills over low-fi shocks – this is probably what the zombie apocalypse will actually look like. Read full review
60
EmpireNick de SemlyenJun 3, 2013
This nightmarish travelogue is coy about gore, but it’s still an effective thrill-ride. If the sequel happens, let’s hope it delivers some actual combat. Read full review
58
The A.V. ClubA.A. Dowd Jun 19, 2013
World War Z bucks the current trend in summer blockbusters by feeling weirdly understuffed. It’s an episodic adventure without enough episodes. Read full review
58
The PlaylistOliver LytteltonJun 7, 2013
The film can be engaging, well-made, and even a touch more interesting than it has much right to be. But it's also far from a satisfying work as a whole. Read full review
50
New York Magazine (Vulture)David EdelsteinJun 21, 2013
Without a character, he’s (Pitt) back to that soft, appraising, Robert Redford Jr. stare, his mouth half open as if he’s about to speak but plainly with nothing on his mind apart from, “This is what a movie star looks like without any lines.” The ghouls are having deeper thoughts. Read full review
50
RogerEbert.comMatt Zoller SeitzJun 21, 2013
Just bloody eye and ear candy. Read full review
50
Miami HeraldRene RodriguezJun 20, 2013
Although there are some initial feints at using zombies as a metaphor for third-world issues and cultural differences, the picture forgets all that stuff by the final reel. World War Z opens with an undeniable bang. But if this is the way the world ends, we’re going out with a whimper. Read full review
50
New York PostKyle SmithJun 18, 2013
So once you figure out the first rule of Zombie Fight Club — nothing too bad can happen to Brad Pitt — the movie is, despite intermittent thrills, rote. Read full review
40
The TelegraphRobbie CollinJun 3, 2013
What we get is a collection of moderately violent action set-pieces untroubled by humour or broader coherence. Read full review
25
Slant MagazineChris CabinJun 19, 2013
The zombies twitch, leap, gnash, and destroy, but the film has all the thrill and surprise of a model U.N. summit. Read full review
20
New York Daily NewsJoe NeumaierJun 18, 2013
It is no summer thriller. It’s an anemic actioner that fosters excitement like dead limbs as it lumbers toward a conclusion. Read full review
More From This Movie

63 Critic Reviews

6.8 User Reviews

Details & Credits|Trailers

Current Movie Releases
By MetascoreBy User Score
1 81 28 Years Later: The Bone Temple
2 77 Project Hail Mary
3 75 Send Help
4 73 Hoppers
5 72 The Sheep Detectives
SEE ALL
Essential Links
New on Amazon Prime Video
New on Netflix
Coming Soon to DVD/Blu-ray
SEE ALL