Jeremy Y. Venook

For the most part, zombies elicit one of two reactions. More often than not, we jump, scream, and run; that’s what most movies that depict the creatures, such as last weekend’s remake of “Evil Dead,” expect of us. Other times, we mow them down with whatever weapons we have available, from machine guns to chainsaws to plants; this response has sold millions of copies of video games like Resident Evil, Left 4 Dead, and, of course, the inimitable Plants vs. Zombies. But there is a third response, and it’s somewhat less commonly tackled in the media:

Through zombies, we reaffirm our humanity.

This, in a nutshell, is what happened when my roommate showed me an Australian short film called “Cargo.” Despite—or, perhaps more accurately, because of—the presence of the undead in the film, it reminded me less of George Romero and more of Cormac McCarthy’s novel “The Road” or Alfonso Cuarón’s masterful filming of “Children of Men.” The video is available for free on YouTube, and it’s only seven minutes long; I highly recommend you take the time to watch it sooner rather than later, not only to understand what I’m saying here but because it is a genuinely beautiful and thought-provoking piece of art.

“Cargo” reminded me that there is an element of the great iconic monsters of art and myth that transcends mere fright. From Darth Vader to Lord Voldemort, to Hal 9000 and Hannibal Lecter, to Dracula and Frankenstein’s Monster—even as far back as Cronus, one of the original abominations of Greek mythology—the most resonant villains, the ones engrained in our cultural memories, are those who exist not only to scare the pants off of us but also to illuminate something meaningful in human nature. We may fear them because they threaten us, but we remember their names and deeds because, in doing so, they expose our most deeply held convictions about humanity.

In their most glaring deficiencies are reflected what we consider mankind’s greatest accomplishments. When the Joker entrusts his detonators to the frightened people of Gotham City in “The Dark Knight,” he is questioning the unshakeable faith we have for our fellow man’s capacity for decency. When haunting serial killer Anton Chigurh of “No Country For Old Men” (or, for that matter, Two-Face in “The Dark Knight”) stakes a life on pure chance in a coin toss, we marvel that we maintain a sense of agency over our own actions that these villains seem to lack. And when Alex of “A Clockwork Orange” commits yet another act of ultraviolence, he highlights through his gross indulgence that we have learned self-control on both an individual and a societal level such that his actions seem horrific and unthinkable.

As a mirror in which to observe humanity, zombies are startlingly effective, not just in “Cargo” but in nearly all of their various iterations. They act as a vaguely humanoid blank slate whose insatiable lust for flesh can be interpreted into a wide array of flaws. The shambling dead have over the decades embodied such total opposites as mindless communism and greedy consumerism, complete apathy and brutal aggression, as the societal situation demands new interpretations. In fact, theories abound online about how the undead in general and zombies specifically reflect the current political climate; for instance, much has been written about the media’s alternating fascination with zombies and with vampires (this year’s pretty evidently a zombie year). For the most part, though, these commentators agree on one thing: we fear zombies because they are, at their most basic level, human but not human beings, a physical facsimile without the emotions on which we depend, which allows us to imbue them with the essence of what we fear most at a given time.

Put simply, “Cargo” succeeds because it eschews the urge to read some deeper symbolism into the zombie apocalypse and instead embraces zombies’ meaning on their own as the ultimate negation of what it means to be human. In the face of zombification, we see a man wordlessly struggle to preserve those elements he fears he will lose. Rather than illuminating that which we fear or hate, it becomes a study of perseverance, ingenuity, and, most powerfully, compassion. “Cargo” ultimately uses its unconventional approach towards its antagonists to strike a deeply resonant chord, one that both is timeless and, unfortunately, became once more extremely timely this past week: it is precisely when must face the worst, whatever that may be, that we as a species will always find the best in ourselves.

—Columnist Jeremy Y. Venook can be reached at jvenook@college.harvard.edu.