The Battery (2012)

Horror and comedy go together (Shaun of the Dead). Horror and science fiction go together (Alien). Even horror and romance go together (Dracula). But horror and sports? The only example I can think of that marries these genres is Teen Wolf (1985), but it’s more of a coming-of-age tale: No one seems particularly concerned that high school basketball player Michael J. Fox is a werewolf. Both horror and sports deal with facing fear, but perhaps the inherent aims of these genres are just too far apart to combine. Add The Battery to the short list of shaky horror and sports fusions. 

Written, directed, and starring Jeremy Gardner (triple threat alert!), The Battery follows former baseball players Ben (Gardner) and Mickey (Adam Cronheim) as they traverse rural New England some time after a zombie apocalypse. (Playing catch and batting practice in an orchard is the extent of the baseball here—sorry, sports fans.) Ben accepts the reality of life among the living dead, which includes using a baseball bat to dispatch ghouls when they appear. Mickey tries to escape this new world, listening to music through headphones almost constantly. A woman’s voice over walkie-talkie mentions a shelter of survivors, and Mickey longs for the world gone by.

The low budget of The Battery is used well, with only one distracting use of CGI. The zombies look good and are of the Romero variety: slow-moving and killed by destroying the brain. But some scenes fall flat, especially near the end of the movie. A fleeting reference to Jaws just made me want to watch Jaws. And a long take where an injured Ben stays behind in a besieged car sans Mickey doesn’t add any tension, as the viewer has also been in the car for at least 30 minutes. The movie ends with a sequel setup that made me feel slightly annoyed at the characters. This is a different kind of zombie movie, but gorehounds and fans of baseball will be left wanting more. 3 out of 5 sacs of blood.

—Nate Logan