Ruben Fleischer

In Zombieland (2009), the survivors have rules for staying alive and rather less patience for one another. Fleischer makes their squabbling the chief attraction, with Jesse Eisenberg and Woody Harrelson supplying most of the pleasure. We laughed at their friction because he gives the irritation of sharing a journey as much attention as the bloodshed. It is a good comedy with a flimsy story, and a poor choice for anyone seeking sustained fear.

His first feature established the mixture of comedy and genre action that runs through the later work. Venom (2018) took him into superhero films, and Uncharted (2022) into video-game adventure. Between them, Zombieland: Double Tap (2019) reunited the original cast, a return consistent with his repeated work with Eisenberg, Harrelson and Emma Stone. That suits a director whose strongest scenes depend on the pleasure of watching people irritate one another.

The trouble is clear in Now You See Me: Now You Don't (2025), which gives its reunited magicians three apprentices and a diamond to steal. For half an hour, the pace suits a heist film built around an ensemble. Rosamund Pike's wealthy villain is another welcome performance, and the glossy bustle has its pleasures. Then Fleischer keeps explaining the illusions just after showing them, leaving little chance to enjoy being fooled. The film spends so much time accounting for its tricks that it leaves the cast little else to play.

Rhett Reese and Paul Wernick wrote Zombieland and share the later film's screenplay credit with Michael Lesslie and Seth Grahame-Smith. The same hurry to reach the next joke is there, now made more wearing by the exposition and callbacks. The friendships in Zombieland are sometimes too easily earned, but Eisenberg and Harrelson make even its routine exchanges enjoyable. Start there if a bloody comedy appeals; for sustained fear, look elsewhere.