What separates this from the rest of the endless current zombie wave isn't the anti-colonialist subtext or that it's the work of indigenous filmmakers, although both of those things are certainly admirable. More importantly it confidently rides a line between the usual Walking Dead-style bleakness and actual satire, with a ton of terrific gore and some real honest-to-God humor instead of camp or silliness. A very good splatter film.

As George Romero first discovered — and hordes of other filmmakers have since refined — zombies are a fun and effective vehicle for addressing the most intractable anxieties of the modern world; even bone-deep social ills have a funny way of seeming more digestible when explored through a story about people rabidly eating each other’s entrails. A scattershot but clear-eyed bit of midnight madness that renders colonialism as a literal plague, Jeff Barnaby’s “Blood Quantum” may bite off more human flesh than it can chew, but this hopeful modern howl against the indignities suffered by Canada’s indigenous population (the Mi’gMaq in particular) is still a credit to its genre. It may not be a great zombie movie, but it’s a uniquely powerful reminder of why zombie movies are great.

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Rock solid premise (providing an underseen racial context to the extinction anxieties of the zombie genre) and Barnaby has good compositional instincts. It looks good and a lot of the gore is stellar. But this needed 7 more drafts on that screenplay, way too many cliché surfaces to really sink into or, honestly, even feel it.

Edit: have upped my rating slightly on rewatch, was able to get over the slight disappointment I had at TIFF that this was more of a derivative Walking Dead familial melodrama than the full-blown, angry Day of the Dead on a native reserve I was hoping for but I've watched a lot of really shitty new release horror recently and revisiting this it was honestly refreshing to watch something that wasn't a vague, droning "Trauma" A24 thing and just simply a competently-made splatter film with very few pretensions of being more than that.

Written, directed and edited by Jeff Barnaby, Blood Quantum is filled with body fluids, intestines and advantageous expressions on colonialism. It's a well-made zombie horror which, despite an irritating inclination to deliver too much expository dialogue, features some kinetically staged set-pieces. The zombie genre has repeatedly carried varying degrees of social criticisms, and the transcendental portrayal here of a too-often distorted image of native Americans is particularly pleasing.

And while it initially appears like it's going to play out in rather a typical genre fare fashion, the film takes an interesting turn at the end of the first act that time jumps the storyline six months to a secure reservation that has become a haven for the indigenous people who are resistant to the virus. From thereon, it delineates similarities between white European expansionists ushering in infectious diseases to the indigenous people, and this theme assumes centre stage allowing this B-movie to standout from usual exploitation films.

Skoden! A movie of the cousins, by the cousins, for the cousins. Land protectors shall inherit the earth. Stoodis!

(You know the movie hella Canadian when they call the zombies ZEDS)

HoopTober 12
13/31 films
Category: 1 film from Canada

The whole of this film worked together pretty well. There were some things that I liked about it, and some that I did not…

My favorite was the score! It was composed by the writer/director, Jeff Barnaby.
I also liked the film’s visual imagery, including the animation segments, which imo enhanced the narrative’s lore.
The “white people as zombies” who took over & infested the Mi'gmaq people’s land made absolute sense. I wish they’d emphasized that more throughout the film.

Sometimes this was boring - more than I would have hoped for. The kills & blood effects were good though. I wanted the film to feel more impactful, for me it just inches into 3 1/2 stars.

This one snuck up on me...
In a landscape where a new zombie pandemic flick is a dull dime a dozen, Jeff Barnaby’s take on the undead is fresh, relevant and GORY AS FUCK. 
Really enjoyed the places this one went.
Must watch on Shudder.