| Dawn of the Dead: The Ultimate Review Dawn of the Dead is the 1978 sequel to the 1968 cult shocker, Night of the Living Dead. Dawn of the Dead, like Night, was directed by George Andrew Romero and since the film's release, it has become an internationally renowned classic among the horror community, yet the film is unheard of among the majority of regular movie goers, i.e. the Hollywood brain slugs have taken place in their brain. If it doesn't have a budget over $100 million, these types probably haven't heard of it. That certainly seems to be the case, but for all of Dawn's quiet playings, it still remains to this day as "one of the best horror films ever made," as well as standing on a very high level in the horror genre. This seems to be a genre defining film as well as a genre bound film. If you're not into horror, you'll probably not have heard of this film. Night of the Living Dead is famous no matter what as it is a film that changed the face of cinema and has been either copied or parodied in such huge cultural institutions as The Simpson's. Night of the Living Dead changed the face of mass-Italian cinema, especially the movement of Lucio Fulci who, most would say, blatantly ripped off Romero's idea. Fulci's zombie movies, most notably, Zombie Flesh Eaters contain graphic violence and blatant gore. The stories are weak and are often all too similar to each other with very little thought put into them. Fulci's work is more grind-house gore than intellectual realisation and visual wonderment. Despite Night's bigger notoriety, Dawn is still viewed as possibly better than Night, and the best out of the cult-famous, 'Living Dead Trilogy,' especially since the budget slashing of Day of the Dead and the shaky remake of Night. If Dawn is viewed so highly, there must be something in it that makes it so loved on such a mass-cult scale. It is this mass-cult that seems to have produced much of the life that this film exists on. In today's day and age of the Internet and other technologies, Dawn of the Dead has found a new life on the net where lovers of the film are able to join together and celebrate this film to their full capability. This has to be a special film, when was the last time you saw such a huge community who loved a film so much for Titanic? Or any other piece of Hollywood processed cheese? Never is the answer. Dawn's uniquely huge popularity across the globe, particularly in the western states of the United Kingdom and the United States, serves as a one-off in film history. Never before has such a film as Dawn, or filmmaker as Romero ever conjured up such a wealth of support from all across the globe. Dawn of the Dead is a unique cult experience and will live on far longer than anything that popular and trendy teeny bopping music is attached to. Dawn of the Dead takes place not too long after the events of Night and depicts the people in the big city of Philadelphia tearing each other apart as the madness and chaos of a television station spills out into the rest of society as SWAT raids on housing tenements reveal hoards of the undead, kept by their past relatives as they "still believe there's respect in dying." For the first half an hour the scene and the mood is established, carrying with it a real sense of 'the end.' People decide to 'run' from the situation, fleeing to find sanctuary in a safe place, away from the masses of the undead that spew from everywhere, consuming everything in their path. Dawn of the Dead is the visually arousing tale of four people running from the madness that their conflicted society isn't helping to sort out. Stephen, a helicopter pilot for WGON and his girlfriend, Fran who also works at WGON take Roger and Peter along with them, two SWAT members who have had enough of the madness after one particularly disastrous raid. On their journey, the four protagonists view the chaos further afield where in the country, large troops of rednecks and army members bind together to go hunting for zombies, chugging down cans of beer and jokes throughout their adventures. Eventually, they must land as fuel is running low. They need sleep, food and shelter. They land on the roof of an abandoned mall in the middle of Pittsburgh, Monroeville Mall. This mall stands as a symbol of society's consumerist ways, the mass-concentration of material goods and the fact that in this money driven world, money has no use. Theft is the only way of gaining goods; most of which are useless, like televisions which are unable to receive broadcasts from closed television stations. As the zombies wander around the mall's two floors and numerous stores, the four main characters must think of a plan to close themselves in, and keep the zombies out. After blocking the doors to the mall with trucks and shooting all the zombies inside, storing them in the meat freezers, they soon create themselves a utopia as zombies outside crawl under the trucks and claw at the safety glass while announcements ring out over the silent hum of the mall's stores. The four soon succumb to the hypnotising effect of the material goods, walking around the mall in fur coats, eating fine meals whilst trying to receive some contact with the outside world through a radio and television. At the same time, they must now care for one of their own whom has been bitten, but who is not long for their world. Slowly, the film descends back into an image of looming doom as a group of raiders gather to invade the mall for material goods. As they break into the mall, which quickly fills again with mindless zombies, the three remaining inhabitants of the mall must defend what is 'theirs' from the raiders, whilst trying to stay alive against a growing hoard of flesh-eating zombies all around them. Finally, the zombies take the mall over again, and once more, the characters must flee this place, in search of sanctuary in a world gone mad. Dawn of the Dead is not just a mindless and dumb zombie film. In fact, the zombies play a relatively subdued part and through the middle of the film, barely make an appearance as the issues of society and consumerism are explored with in depth montages accompanied by glorious stock music or tracks from Goblin. The way in which the people on the outside interact and try to come to terms with their deaths is viewed through the medium of the television. Scientist's struggle to influence other's ways of thinking as the dollar slowly becomes more and more transparent. One point that many people make about this film is about the special effects. The zombies may seem to have a blue skin, but it is actually a cold gray colour, much like in real life when people have just died. The effects are brought to life by Tom Savini, who had since worked on other Romero films like Martin. The wizard of gore was at this stage, relatively young in his methods used for the gory spectacles, but nonetheless skilled. Whether it be decapitating zombies with machetes or maces, blowing zombie's brains out or just blowing their heads off, Savini makes every effect ooze with spectacle and a special feeling of expert application. The people who generally moan about Dawn's effects are the types of people who like to see computer graphics make almost the entire movie, so I guess Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within is just their movie! However, these people refuse to realise that this film was made in the 1970's, and the effects were, for their time, mind-blowingly realistic and awe-inspiring. In fact, some of the effects are still so good, that there are films made today that have worse effects! However, Tom Savini in fact founded his entire career on Dawn of the Dead as this film got him the job on Friday the 13th and Maniac which set him as a god-like figure among the splatter artists of the world. The effects in Dawn are way past inventive and stand in a light of their own. Helicopter blade head chops, head explosions creating using a real shotgun, machete brain slicings, all effects put to great effect, soaking the screen with the dripping, red blood. The people who whine about the effects fail to notice the comic book style of the film. The blood is red, not red-brown and the zombie's make-up is simple and one toned. Dawn of the Dead is a living comic book and often attracts attention through this luscious style. If viewing in a wrong way, the effects can be interpreted as basic and badly used. However, if you actually open your eyes and brain for more than a millisecond and actually think about it instead of sucking on another king-size coke while holding a big box or Milk-Duds, you would actually see why the effects are so. This is a thinking man's horror film, and it certainly requires your full attention as well as your full brain capacity. This is not the film for people who judge books by their covers. These people are those that place everything into a stereotype, this is a zombie movie, that means people staggering around, arms outstretched eating people's brains and nothing else. Well, Romero proved them all wrong, despite the famous Nurse zombie. Dawn of the Dead also has many treasures of style. This can be viewed to full effect in the ultimate cut of the movie, the fullest cut, the Director's Cut. There is barely a moment that is silent throughout the entire movie. Either speech, music or both fill the soundtrack, pulling the movie along at a nice pace. This is quite a task to achieve. If this movie didn't have so much music, it might seem longer and a little slower, but the music brings every shot and scene together, linking the movie together in a long chain of classic moments beautifully shot in wonderful perspective. The actual setting itself, the mall, is also a landmark in the filming. The mall, with its long running central corridor, the multiple angles of mass-perspective, lights reflecting off the hundreds of panes of glass and the empty, gaping hole that exists within the walls adds a real sense of open claustrophobia. Much like Night of the Living Dead, but this time, the claustrophobia is not there because of the small setting, much the opposite. The large setting gives a sense of space and large-scale marketing, but it also acts as a prison in which the four characters voluntarily lock themselves in. In almost every shot in the mall, a sense of perspective is given. Whether it be two characters confined to a small, long corridor, or the hoards of zombies staggering about the full stretch of the mall, disappearing into the distance. One of the virtues of this film is also the fact that the actors used were all unknowns. Therefore, you identify with the characters, not the actors. This therefore ups the believability of the entire film and all scenes in which the four protagonists must strive to stay alive are acted out with wonderful senses of life and being. You feel as if you're in this movie with them, watching them both live like they've always wanted, plucking riches from the tree of wealth, but also whilst being confined within a self-made prison. The pacing of the movie varies with the differing versions of the film out there, but the best cut, the director's cut is the most complete, and therefore, longest cut, running at 2 hours and 20 minutes. However, it barely seems any time as each shot and scene are woven together to fit into one solid piece. You never find yourself drifting into a coma with boredom, as the film never lets you do so. Quick cuts and slices of stock music as well as the loud and barbaric sales announcements ring out proudly. This movie gallops along at a spectacular pace, always striving to use every possible creative outlet available to stun you, shock you and stimulate you. The view that this is possibly the best ever zombie movie in history is not hard to understand. Everything about this movie is fantastic, setting, effects, style, acting; everything is amazing and awe-inspiring. The real sense of family depicted in the making-of video, Document of the Dead, really gives this film a heart and soul of it's own. This isn't straight to video tosh, nor is it mindless Hollywood spectacle and square jawed action heroes tackling big-breasted bimbos. Dawn of the Dead is a wonderfully constructed piece of film-making, and despite some flaws, mainly due to a small, but well-used budget, or just the time the film was made, this film still stands as a hugely brilliant pillar in the coliseum of the horror genre and never fails to achieve in all aspects of film-making, characterisation and pacing. If you are the sort of person who loves a good, well made film, full of life (despite the undead occupants!) and always serves a good, thought-provoking horror show, come on in and enjoy. If you are however, the sort of person who likes, nay, loves to mindlessly gawp at big breasted or big jawed Hollywood living dolls yomp around a big budget setting to a script that could have been written by a chimp, stay away and never, ever comment on this film, ever. Because if you do, you'll become an even worse filmgoer who judges everything by the cover. Dawn of the Dead is an intelligent piece of filmmaking with a strong script, powerful actors and a fantastic everything else. If you like teeny bopping shit, steer clear, as Dawn of the Dead actually made itself up on its own, it didn't copy, it didn't get inspired by some shit horror movie franchise made by someone who used to make good movies, it did it all by itself, marvelously directed and beautifully captured. Dawn of the Dead is the thinking man's zombie movie, a cult classic, and a piece of artwork in its own right. An icon of the horror genre, popular among its followers beyond belief, anyone who watches this film and loves it will do so for the rest of their life, perhaps even after they die. I myself am already making plans to be buried with my first copy of the film, as I love it so dearly. Don't call me sad, because if you do, you just haven't found something you love so much that you'd want to die with it. Finally, to sum up, Dawn of the Dead is the Shakespeare of zombie movies, the sultan of horror and the leader of the pack. Don't miss out. |