Night Of The Zoopocalypse (PG)

A mysterious meteorite succumbs to Earth's gravitational pull and a fragment crashes into the petting zoo of Colepepper Zoo where a cute, wide-eyed bunny eats the luminous shard and slowly mutates into a slavering, fanged predator. The contagion spreads rapidly from Bunny Zero to other feathered and furry residents. Gracie the woof is in a cage in the veterinary office when the outbreak begins and she spearheads a daredevil resistance with Dan the mountain lion and friends,

LondonNet Film Review

Night Of The Zoopocalypse (PG) Film Review from LondonNet

Creatures great and small unite to survive a zombie apocalypse in a rollicking computer-animated escapade for the whole family, co-directed by Ricardo Curtis and Rodrigo Perez-Castro. Inspired by a short story idea by Clive Barker, Night Of The Zoopocalypse engineers enough PG-friendly shocks to delight young audiences, including a zombie gorilla which loses one of its legs in a fight. The infected appendage runs amok, like Thing from The Addams Family, independent from the rest of the ape until it can reattach itself…

Scriptwriters James Kee and Steven Hoban supply a steady stream of giggles, relying heavily on in-jokes from a cinema-obsessed French lemur, who is well versed in the rules of survival if you become trapped inside a horror movie. A squeaky pink elephant toy ruins one hushed escape from an infected gazelle. “A convenient plot device!” whoops the lemur, giving the toy an additional squeeze for good measure to draw further attention to his location. Energetic vocal performances match the bright, colourful visuals and Curtis and Perez-Castro maintain dramatic momentum by distributing breathless chase sequences evenly across the brisk running time.

Gracie the wolf (voiced by Gabbi Kosmidis) prefers to play with the rest of her pack at Colepepper Zoo rather than practise her safety drills. “Something bad, or worse, is gonna happen!” prophetically warns Grandma Abigale (Carolyn Scott). That night, a mysterious meteorite succumbs to Earth’s gravitational pull and a fragment crashes into the petting zoo where a cute, wide-eyed bunny eats the luminous shard and slowly mutates into a slavering, fanged predator capable of infecting other animals with a single bite. The contagion spreads rapidly from Bunny Zero (Bryn McAuley) to other feathered and furry residents including Fred the gorilla (Kyle Derek).

Thankfully, Gracie is in a cage in the veterinary office when the outbreak begins and she spearheads a daredevil resistance comprising Ash the ostrich (Scott Thompson), Dan the mountain lion (David Harbour), Felix the monkey (Paul Sun-hyung Lee), Frida the capybara (Heather Loreto) and Xavier the lemur (Pierre Simpson). A cute, pink pygmy hippo named Poot (Christina Nova) rallies to the amusingly disorganised cause and survivors pledge to prevent Bunny Zero from escaping the zoo’s confines and restore order to the cages and enclosures.

Night Of The Zoopocalypse is an entertaining walk on the wild side with pawsome characters who learn the value of teamwork in outlandish adversity. “It takes a whole pack working together, howling together… to survive,” wisely professes Abigale. The green, purple and black-heavy colour palette gets into the Halloween spirit and any on-screen violence is cartoonish to nimbly sidestep the chance of a sleepless night.

– Sarah Lee