The Crazies is a mediocre movie which means, in terms of the Zombie genre, it's slightly above average. The film has a couple of great scenes and a decent number of scares but it just kind of rambles about and there isn't really a main focus to give the film any momentum. People just kind of go from one dark place (where they inexplicably split up) to the next (where they decide to leave their pregnant wife by herself). There was probably three film's worth of intriguing concepts in the film but the movie didn't really make anything out of them, usually just getting one "He's behind you!" moment and then moving on. There was also a lot of "sit back, hide, and watch" moments; for a large part of the second act, it was almost like I was watching someone else watch a horror movie.

The acting was solid with Joe Anderson possibly outshining Timothy Olyphant, especially in one pitch perfect moment that I don't want to ruin. Olyphant was solid, as always, but I'd like to see him break out of the Deadwood typecasting he's found himself in and try to flash some personality ala his role in "Go".

The film looked very nice but I often felt like the film focused too much on cinematography and it deadened some of the scares. It's the kind of film that might have been scarier with a lower budget feel to it.

As I walked out after the movie, a lot of people seemed to like the film but I wouldn't really recommend it. The Rotten Tomatoes/Metacritic scores are probably right - fans of the genre will think it's a 71% film while non-fans will probably see it as 56% (or maybe even a bit lower). Personally, I'd say it's a film best "discovered" on the movie channels on TV. The lower expectations, the better.