Want to know what went wrong with Brad Pitt’s zombie flick World War Z?

Last Updated on July 23, 2021

With the release date being pushed back, additional weeks of shooting and bringing in writers to help with the story, we already knew Marc Forster’s WORLD WAR Z had some trouble. Now, thanks to a story run by The Hollywood Reporter, we might have a more detailed view of what exactly went wrong with the movie’s development.

THR quoted multiple sources tied to the production, one of which called the making of the movie “a nightmare from top to bottom”. Sources seem to agree that there were two main problems – one being that the film was rushed into production without a clear plan. As one insider states:

“They just couldn’t get it right. There was a lot of spinning of plates, a lot of talking. [But] they did not have a plan.”

The other issue seemed to be the hiring of Marc Foster, a director who had never worked on such an immense production. As the article states, “the hope was that Forster could focus on character and story while a strong crew could guide him on action and effects”. Sadly, that didn’t seem to be the case.

“The director was not empowered. There was nobody that steered the ship. When you get [a director] who can’t do it all… you get a struggle as to whose is the singular voice.”

Crew members were replaced, members of the cast (including Pitt himself) were busy doing other projects, unforeseen complications arose (including a Hungarian anti-terrorist team confiscating 85 automatic assault rifles that were to be used in the movie), spirits on the set kept deteriorating and the budget started getting out of hand.

Still, there are also those who believe that a satisfying finish to the project is still well within reach. One of them is Paramount film group president Adam Goodman, who told THR:

“The footage from this film looks fantastic, but we all agreed it can have a better ending. Getting the ending correct is essential, and we are in that creative process. World War Z is a giant summer movie and we are confident it will be a global hit when it’s released June 2013.”

Given that another source claimed that “it’s a great first 45 minutes, maybe even an hour”, it seems like the torturous production can still yield a successful movie. Stranger things have definitely happened. We’ll look forward to seeing how it all goes down during the upcoming months of scheduled reshoots.

WORLD WAR Z stars Brad Pitt, Mireille Enos (below), Matthew Fox, Elyes Gabel, David Morse and James Badge Dale. The film is still planned for a June 21, 2013 release.