Day of the Dead (1985)

Running Time: 102 minutes
Directed By: George A. Romero
Written By: George A. Romero
Main Cast: Lori Cardille, Terry Alexander, Joseph Pilato, Jarlath Conroy, Anthony Dileo Jr.
Click here to view the trailer

FRIGHTFEST 2013: NIGHT TWO

"Day of the Dead" sort of hits close to home, as it not only features make-up and special effects by Tom Savini, a Pittsburgh native (only sixty miles or so from me), but also stars Lori Cardille as the main character, daughter of long time Pittsburgh broadcaster Bill Cardille, nicknamed "Chilly Billy" for his hosting duties on Chiller Theatre, an old Saturday night horror movie program that aired in the Pittsburgh area. Bill also appeared in the original "Night of the Living Dead", as well as the 1990 remake, directed by Tom Savini.

Anyway...

I'll tell you right now that the film is EASILY the worst when put head to head (to head) with "Night of the Living Dead" and "Dawn of the Dead", but I'll save the opinion column for a little further down the page. The film starts with a pretty eerie dream sequence in which we see the main character, Dr. Sarah Bowman (Cardille), sitting alone in an asylum-type room. Once she snaps back to reality, we learn that the events that began in "Night of the Living Dead" and continued in "Dawn of the Dead" are still taking place and now we zoom in on a small group of survivors, holed up in an underground, military compound. Among the survivors are two, smaller groups: the doctors and the military men, as well as two pilots. The doctors and the military men are always at odds with one another, mainly due to the tyrannical behavior of Captain Rhodes (Pilato). The doctors, fully aware tha
t the humans are outnumbered by the "undead", try doing experiments on them, trying to tame them and possibly domesticate them. The experiments are headed up by a particular doctor, Dr. Logan and his star "pupil", whom he calls Bub, a member of the undead clan whom Dr. Logan has made lots of progress with, teaching him to use a gun and salute the military men. Of course, things go awry...

My biggest problem with "Day of the Dead" was the lack of action and the fact that we really don't get into the humans vs. zombies part of the story until something like the last thirty minutes. Prior to that, the real conflict of this movie isn't the humans vs. the monsters, but the humans vs. each other, as the doctors and the soldiers engage in, what seems like, a never ending war of words. I love, love, love a good zombie flick, but I think most zombie movie lovers would agree that the meat & potatoes of any good zombie flick is the survivalist qualities, the "how are they going to get out of this jam" or the "oh no, there's fifty zombies between him and where he needs to be, let's see how he gets out of this!". I was shocked when I looked on IMDB and saw that this film has a healthy '7.0' rating. You have to figure that the majority of the people rating this are the real horror junkies and in my opinion, this just wasn't up to snuff with other, better horror or even more specifically, other zombie movies - especially Romero's zombie movies.

Otherwise, if you want to get technical, the make-up and effects were pretty B.A., as you can never go wrong with Greg Nicotero and Tom Savini, who know their stuff when it comes to making things look extra f'd up. I've included a few pictures here, but as far as just how gruesome these zombies look, there's no comparison to "Night of" or "Dawn of". Unfortunately, it's a shame that the zombies look the best in a film where they're not at the forefront of the plot for most of the time.

I think I can be quoted, at one time on this blog, as saying I'm not really a horror guy. I've realized recently that that's an absolutely false statement. As much as I didn't care for this on a quality movie level, I have to admit that it was a lot of fun at times and ultimately I had fun watching, even though I had some severe gripes. If you're just looking for a cheap thrill, then this should do the trick. However, if you want quality, like me, then you need to opt for either "Night of" or "Dawn of" and forget "Day of".

RATING: 4/10  Yeah, that's about as good as it gets from me. I just can't go any higher. Had they put the zombies a little more "out there" and made them more prevalent, this would've been fine, but it is what it is. 

October 26, 2013  8:00pm

638. Dawn of the Dead (1978)

Running Time: 127 minutes
Directed By: George A. Romero
Written By: George A. Romero
Main Cast: David Emge, Ken Foree, Scott Reiniger, Gaylen Ross
Click here to view the trailer

FRIGHTFEST 2012: PART 2

"When there's no more room in hell, the dead will walk the Earth."

Continuing on with "Frightfest 2012", we come to a movie that was introduced to me by my brother, back in the 90s - "Dawn of the Dead". The film takes place following the events of "Night of the Living Dead", a movie that I previously reviewed for this blog, but one that didn't leave a substantial impact on me.

We pick up where we left off in "Night of the Living Dead", with zombies running wild in the streets and we zoom in on Philadelphia and chaos at a local news station. Two staff members at the local station, Stephen (Emge) and his girlfriend Francine (Ross) plan to take a helicopter out of town and look for a more desolate location, where they can lay low. They are joined by two SWAT Team members, Roger (Reiniger) and Peter (Foree) and the foursome take to the skies in the helicopter. When they are in danger of running out of gas, they stop to refill and later land on top of a mall, thinking that it will be a good spot to fend off the undead creatures. Tucked away inside the mall and holed up in a security office, the group take inventory of their supplies and what they'll need to survive. Despite the fact that the mall is teeming with zombies, Peter and Roger decide to make their way into the shopping center and pickup necessary supplies: a television, guns, ammunition, a radio and walkie talkies. Later, Roger and Peter also deem it necessary to block the entrances to the shopping mall so that once they kill all the zombies that are on the inside, they won't have to worry about more coming in. As they're driving large trucks to block the entrances, Roger is bitten by one of the undead. With his inevitable transformation on the horizon, Peter, Stephen and Francine rush to make their mall inhabitable, before Roger becomes one of THEM!

SPOILER ALERT! 

Even though I had a lot of fun with this movie, I'm going to start off the review portion of this post by bitching a little bit, because, lets face it, it's what I do best. Honestly, all in all, I was ultimately a little bit disappointed with "Dawn of the Dead". I had this movie pegged for at least a '9', if not a full blown '10' and after today's viewing I certainly won't be handing out either of those numbers. For starters, the film ran a little on the long side and there was a definite chunk in there that I think we could've done without. The point where the gang of four rid the mall of all the zombies and just begin living life inside the mall gets a little boring because, lets face it, we don't go to zombie movies to see people sitting around, proposing marriage, staging fancy restaurant getaways and playing mall arcade games. We go to zombie movies to see people kick some serious zombie booty and when that isn't happening here, it gets a little tiresome. I also could've done without the biker gang at the end of the movie, as it diverted the attention away from the zombies and focused the threat on other humans, who were mad because they didn't hole up in the mall. I think a better ending would've been just having the zombies find a way into the mall and since there were so many of them building up on the outside all these months, they would've overtaken Peter, Stephen and Francine.

However, I don't want to bash this film too much, because despite the fact that I was disappointed, I still had a blast with it. No one can deny that Romero found his niche when he ventured into the world of undead cinema. It's also interesting to note that I never look at Romero's zombie movies as horror films. Even when I saw this film as a kid, I didn't walk away frightened. Instead, I view them as survival films that just happen to feature intense scenes of gore. The movies, for me, aren't really about zombies, but rather about shit going down and a group of people banding together to survive. This movie is a REALLY easy one to like and even people who aren't really into horror movies should still be able to find something to enjoy here. I mean, come on, who doesn't dream about running rampant through a shopping mall and hunting zombies? I know I do! Also, with my recent viewing of my first set of Jackie Chan pictures and after watching this today, I realized what (one of) my ultimate movie fantasies are: I want to see a zombie movie starring Jackie Chan! I mean, how fucking incredible would that be? It would have to be Jackie Chan in his prime, so to do this I'd need a time machine, but I would watch the shit out of that movie and don't tell me you wouldn't! You'd mix the martial arts, jaw dropping, gravity defying stunts of a Jackie Chan movie with the survivalist nature of a zombie film and you'd have some kick-ass scenes. Can't you just picture Chan roundhouse kicking a zombies head off his shoulders and using set pieces and Buster Keaton like stunts to think of clever ways to decapitate the undead? GOLD!

EDIT: It's also worth noting that this movie was primarily filmed inside Monroeville Mall, a mall very close to Pittsburgh and one that I've never been to, despite it being about an hour or so from where I live.

RATING: 7.5/10  It was between a '7.5' and an '8', so I played it safe and went with the low number. Perhaps come RECAP time, it will go up. We'll continue "Frightfest 2012" in a day or two, with my next installment.

MOVIES WATCHED: 560
MOVIES LEFT TO WATCH: 441

October 25, 2012  7:46pm

491. Night of the Living Dead (1968)

Running Time: 96 minutes
Directed By: George A. Romero
Written By: George A. Romero, John A. Russo
Main Cast: Duane Jones, Judith O'Dea, Karl Hardman, Marilyn Eastman, Keith Wayne

"THEY'RE COMING TO GET YOU BARBARA"

Working my way through the Netflix streaming catalog of movies that I need to watch, I decided to check out "Night of the Living Dead", on this very cold, dreary, February day in southwestern PA...where, as a matter of fact, this film is set and filmed.

Barbara (O'Dea) and her brother Johnny have decided to spend their Sunday (unwillingly) driving 200 miles to the cemetery where their father is buried to place a wreath on his grave. While in the cemetery, a man approaches them and begins to attack. Barbara gets away, but Johnny gets into a tussle with the "man" and is knocked unconscious when his head hits a grave marker. The man, who it later turns out is actually a zombie, turns his attention to Barbara, but she manages to escape to a nearby farmhouse. Soon after, night falls and she is joined by Ben (Jones), another human seeking refuge from the monsters that lurk outdoors. Ben is the voice of reason, as Barbara is in shock and out of her mind. Ben realizes that the doors and windows need to be boarded up and without questioning the origin of the monsters, does what he has to do to survive. Later, Ben and Barbara are joined by Harry (Hardman) & Helen (Eastman) and Tom (Wayne) & Judy, who have been holed up in the cellar the entire time. Harry and Helen are married with a hurt child who is also on board and Tom and Judy seem to be a newlywed couple. Harry and Ben clash, as they try to think of the best way to survive and last the longest. Do they stay upstairs, where they'll hear help arrive (if it arrives) or do they lock themselves in the cellar, where they'll be more secure?

POSSIBLE SPOILER ALERT!

Believe it or not, this is actually the first time that I ever saw the original "Night of the Living Dead", even more surprising due to the fact that it was filmed very near to where I live and grew up, which you think would've peaked my interest. I've always loved movies that take a group of people, put them in a small setting and give them a problem and the tension is even more relevant, considering the size of this groups problem. Not only a horror movie, but "Night of the Living Dead" is also a very well put together character study, as we see different types of people forced to be enclosed with one another and conflict arises. You have the family man, with the fatherly instincts, who thinks he is always right. You have Ben, who worked to board the old farmhouse up and get it secure so that he and Barbara could survive and who is also the voice of reason when hot heads prevail. You have Barbara, who is totally off her rocker, and so the characters are forced to deal with her and ultimately are forced to band together as a group and think of a strategy that will help them live.

I liked the movie, and with a little research found that the budget was a mere $114,000, which makes me admire it even more. Of course it's not the greatest looking of all films, but the worn out picture quality fit in well with the fictional crisis and actually enhanced the experience for me. I also loved the ending, despite the fact that it was tragic. Too many times do we see cliche's, where everything just ends up working out for the best. It was a breath of fresh air to see Romero go in the opposite direction of the cliche ending, in a time before it was even a cliche. Another great thing to see, that kind of goes hand in hand with the small budget, was the relative no name cast that Romero assembled and how terrific of a job they all did. You can actually tell that everyone on board wanted the film to be a success, as it comes out in their performances. A success it was, as now it's (apparently) one of the 1001 Movies You Must See Before You Die.

RATING: 7/10 I'll have to check out Dawn of the Dead and Day of the Dead and all of the other dead Romero films when I get some free time.

MOVIES WATCHED: 209
MOVIES LEFT TO WATCH: 792

February 9, 2011 6:30pm