Day 1 of Halloween: Day of the Dead

Jason: It’s been awhile since I’ve watched this movie. It isn’t my favorite of the Romero “Of The Dead” films but it is still fun! These movies were not made purely as scary horror movies. Each of them has their own little something to say about society and politics. “Night of the Living Dead” highlighted the struggles between perceived social and racial classes in the 60’s. “Dawn of the Dead” is clearly about the degradation of a consumerist society. Finally, “Day of the Dead” came out in the mid 80’s amidst the Cold War. In the movie, the characters butt heads continually about how to face the impending threat of annihilation. Should they attack it head on, matching violence for violence? Or should they take a more civil and rational approach? In the end, it didn’t really matter because nearly everyone gets eaten by freakin zombies! But still, to think about the context of the film’s message is part of the experience.

As far as zombie movies go, this is a classic. It is an example for and role model for zombies to come far and wide. It’s always amused me the range of costumes shown in this movie for the undead. There is a bride, a man in a tux, a hospital patient in a dressing gown, and even a clown. (shudder…) Where would all these people have come from to end up in the same place? I mean, I assume that there are many different people at any given time dressed in these different costumes but how did they all come together at the same time like that? In any case, think of all the zombie clowns and zombie brides you’ve seen over the past few years in games, movies, tv shows. It’s all thanks to this movie. Thanks George Romero and Tom Savini.

On a side note, I had forgotten that the opening of the song “M1-A1” by the Gorillaz was pulled straight from the beginning of this film! I love it.

Joel: As far as series order goes, the Living Dead series is a mess. It’s clear that it starts with Night of the Living Dead, but after that it goes everywhere. There’s the trilogy of Dead films that Romaro made, plus another three that he made twenty years later. Then there’s the Return of the Living Dead series which spun off of the original Night of the Living Dead and had several installments. Then several of the movies had their own sequels or remakes, some official, some not so much, and the Italian made Zombi series that spins off in a different direction than everything else. Add to the fact that most of the time each movie contains an entirely new set of characters and you can pretty much watch these in any order you feel like. Day of the Dead is the third move in Romero's original trilogy. Like his other movies Romero likes to use the zombie apocalypse to focus on a message, this time the message being about how a lack of communication can be perhaps the biggest downfall of human society. The film clearly has  a limited budget that forced most of the actual zombie interactions to wait until the very end of the movie. (in fact up until the last ten minutes of the movie only two zombies are killed.) It’s a good movie with interesting characters thrown into a stressful situation, but not one for you if you’re looking for a lot of zombie action. It’s like that season of The Walking Dead where they had to stay on the farm for the whole time because of budget issues behind the scenes.

Chris: I feel like I’m going to preface every single one of my reviews for these movies with the declaration of “I’ve always hated horror movies.” Which forces one to wonder why in the world did I call Jason (our resident horror movie expert) a few months back and ask if he would be willing to do a “Summer of Netflix” but for horror movies leading up to Halloween. I’m a glutton for punishment and I suppose it’s about time that I finally check to see what all the fuss was about with this horror flicks. And so we start with Day of the Dead, a zombie movie that’s highly respected among a lot of the horror fans that I’m friends with. It’s one of those movies that if I had been around and watched it when it came out that I would appreciate Day of the Dead a little bit more. However, with the impressive make-up and prosthetic work done on things like The Walking Dead, it’s hard for me to appreciate that aspect of DotD. I wasn’t a fan of a lot of the acting, everybody was either over-acting cowards, racists and/or psychopaths. The one character that really got under my skin was Miguel and found myself cheering for the zombies when it came to him. And yes, the overall message of the dangers of the lack of communication, discourse and trust is a good frame for the story and proves that the absence of those traits in a society is more dangerous than any other outside force. Not terrible start to the 13 Days of Halloween but don’t consider me impressed just yet. Good luck tomorrow.

Tomorrow's Movie: The Babadook