SCHOOL OF ARCHITECTURE, BUILDING AND DESIGN

THE DESIGN SCHOOL

FOUNDATION IN NATURAL BUILD ENVIRONMENT

NAME: LIEW POH KA

STUDENT ID NO: 0320424

FILMS SELECTED: CHERNOBYL DAIRIES, ZOMBIELAND

WORD COUNT: 1045

ENGLISH 2 (ELG 30605)

WRITTEN ASSIGNMENT 1: COMPARE – CONTRAST ESSAY

LECTURER: CASSANDRA WIJESURIA

SUBMISSION DATE: APRIL 8TH, 2015

PRE-WRITING

Van goes wrong

Night falls, arguing and affixing blame begin

Noises heard outside

Everyone afraid and stay in van

Zombies everywhere

People found stars’ home

Stay in residence

Travel to Europe

Radiated Chernobyl

Mad cow disease

30 rules

Heading to LA amusement park

Reckless person

Arrogant person

Shy person

Friendly and passionate

Filming location

Chernobyl, Ukraine

Abandoned house

Nuclear power station

America

Bill Murray’s residence

Theme park

Pacific Playland

Contrast Essay between Chernobyl Dairies and Zombieland

A disaster film is a film genre that has an impending or ongoing disaster as its subject

and primary plot device. There are some disasters include natural disasters such as floods,

earthquakes and also accidents such as worldwide disease pandemics. I will be contrasting

the differences of two disaster movies which are “Chernobyl Dairies” and “Zombieland”. The

“Chernobyl Dairies” is released on 24th May 2012 directed by Bradley Parker. On the other

hand, the “Zombieland” is released on 2nd October 2009 directed by Ruben Fleischer. There

are similarities and differences between the two movies, however, I choose to contrast the

differences of the place where people hide for survive, the storyline, characteristics of main

actors and settings.

There was a place where people hide for survive. In the movie “Chernobyl Dairies“,

the survivors are staying in the van for survive a short time. When the people are going to

leave Chernobyl, something happened to the van. They find out the wires in their van have

been chewed through. They do not know who did it or what kind of animal did it. They also

try to radio for help to no avail. The tour guide, Uri get down from the van and try to fix it

back but he couldn’t and other people remain in the van. As night falls, the group begins

arguing and affixing blame. Noises are heard outside and Uri goes out with a flashlight and a

gun. Shots are heard. People in the van are afraid. They stay in the van the whole night. On

the other hand, for the movie “Zombieland“, the survivors are staying in a residence.

Zombies are everywhere. The people travel from another place to Hollywood. When they

arrive in Hollywood, they dodge zombies and use a map of stars’ home to find Bill Murray’s

residence. Bill Murray’s residence is a distance from the zombie. So that they manage to stay

there until they have a new plan. They play together in the residence, fooling around and also

they sleep there. It is the safest place for them to stay for survive.

The storyline for both movies are completely different. The movie “Chernobyl

Dairies“ is about the Americans Chris, his girlfriend Natalie and their friend Amanda and

Paul travel to Europe on vacation. Chris wants to travel to Moscow to propose to Natalie, but

Paul convinces the group to first visit to Chernobyl with an extreme tourist guide. They meet

the guide Uri and another couple who are also going on the tour. Uri explains that because of

the radiation levels he can only take them to Pripyat, a deserted city very near Chernobyl.

They travel by van, but are stopped by a military checkpoint that makes them turn back. Not

giving up, Uri finds an alternative route to the town. The group spends the day taking

photographs and exploring abandoned buildings. Uri becomes nervous and decides it's time

to head home. However, the van won't start and they discover the engine was sabotaged.

Soon they discover that they are stranded, no one knows they are there and that they are

definitely not alone. On the contrary, in the movie “Zombieland“, in the early twenty-first

century, mad cow diseases have turned everyone into zombies and zombies have taken over

America. A shy and inexperienced college student in Texas has survived by following his 30

rules: such as "look in the back seat," "double-tap," "avoid public restrooms". He decides to

travel to Ohio to see if his parents are alive. He gets a ride with a boisterous zombie-hating

good-old boy headed for Florida, and soon they confront a young woman whose sister has

been bitten by a zombie and wants to be put out of her misery. The sisters are headed to an

LA amusement park they've heard is zombie free. Also, they kill zombies when they are on

their way to their final destination.

The main actors in both movies have different characteristics. In the movie “Chernobyl

Dairies“, Paul is a reckless person. The tourism guide, Uri told Paul about Chernobyl is a

dangerous place. Chernobyl is abandoned for many years because there was a nuclear power

plant explosion and the place is highly radiated. Paul does not want to care about the

radiation there and also he does not think of his friends’ health if he decides to go Chernobyl.

Other than that, Paul is also an arrogant person. He always thinks he very smart, he also

makes decisions without think of aftermath. He gets into trouble after he decides to get down

from the van to find out where the noises come from. At last he gets a severe hurts after he

back to their van. Besides that, he is a selfish person. He doesn’t want to care about his

friends’ safety. He only wants to make sure he and his girlfriend are safe to escape from the

place. Lastly he dies in this place because of his selfishness. Conversely, Columbus in the

movie “Zombieland” is a shy person. He is shy when he is with one of the sisters, Wichita.

He fell in love with Wichita. He feels uncomfortable when only he and Wichita because he is

very conservative person and reversely, Wichita is a friendly and passionate person.

Columbus is also a timid man. He is afraid of zombies and so he created 30 rules for himself

against the zombies. He also helps his friends when they are surrounded with bunch of

zombies. This shows he is a kind person who takes good care of his friends.

The filming location for both movies is dissimilar. In addition, the filming location for

the movie “Chernobyl Dairies“ is at Chernobyl, Ukraine where it features the abandoned

housing of Pripyat and the Chernobyl nuclear power station. The other filming location for

the scene before the people travels to Chernobyl, they are filmed at America. They are all met

there and decide to travel to Europe for vacation. Meanwhile for the movie “Zombieland“, all

scenes are filmed in USA. The location when they found Bill Murray’s residence for them to

stay overnight is filmed in Atlanta, USA. The other scene where the theme park scenes for

the film’s climax, Pacific Playland, are mostly shot in Valdosta, Georgia’s local theme park

Wild Adventures Water and Theme Park.

Finally, “Chernobyl Dairies” and “Zombieland” are both differs from the place where

people stay for survive, storylines, main actor’s characteristics and also their filming location.

In my opinion, I love both movies as “Chernobyl Dairies” is about people becoming mutant

because of the explosion of nuclear plant, whereas “Zombieland” is about people becoming

zombies because of the disease-hamburger, and both have their interesting part. Although

there are not many people know both of these movies, but still both of the movies have

nominated for awards and won numerous awards.

Reference

1. Chernobyl Dairies- Filming Location (2012)

www.imdb.com/title/tt1991245/

2. Zombieland- Shooting Locations (2009)

www.imdb.com/title/tt1156398/

3. Zombieland- rules

www. zombieland rules.com/

4. Chernobyl Dairies- Synopsis

http://chernobyldiaries.warnerbros.com/dvd/