Dawn of the Dead (1978)

ALRIGHT FLYBOY! NOW WE 'VE GOT A WAR!!!!!
DAWN OF THE DEAD is a classic in the HORROR genre and I just had to watch
this again last night. I love this movie true the zombies look fake
especially when compared to Fulci's classic ZOMBIE but WHO CARES!!!
We have a story with characters that I found myself caring about
a great script and find directing. Sir Romero has always been great at
adding humor to his HORROR and D.O.T.D. is no exception from the beginning
we have chaos for the entire United States is being plagued by zombies
and the few humans that are alive must leave but to where???
Our four heroes steal a helicopter and find a abandon shopping mall.
We are already 20 min. into the movie but this is where it starts for
me for this is where I found myself caring about the four stars and hoping they all make it alive(which is unusual for your buddy Clint
for normally I say LET THEM DIE!) When two of our heroes GET IT
so to speak I was angry! The way this movie builds up and ends
was funtastic(sic) and I am truly glad to have in my HORROR COLL.
If you are not big on GORE(shame on you) than please stay away
however if you can handle heads chopped off by helicopter,limbs
being eaten and children being blown away by a machine gun than
by all means watch DAWN of the DEAD for it is ONE of our greatest
HORROR films especially for 78(the awesome HALLOWEEN and INVASION of the
BODY SNATCHERS also came out this year) the ultimate edition is the
only way to go on this flick for it has in depth views on the making
and of course all three versions of the film(I prefer the extended
version myself Romero's dir.cut is 2nd and you can have the awful
Dario Argento cut LOVE YA DARIO STILL) anyway if you love HORROR
DAWN of the DEAD is a must!!!

A CLASSIC HORROR FILM THAT HOLDS UP AFTER YEARS
DAWN OF THE DEAD is a classic horror film although only a short time has passed since it was released. With a remake in the works it's important to go back and take a look at the original. And it's a horror film that loses nothing with time.

The story picks up where the original left off, a world where flesh eating zombies are roaming the countryside in search of fresh kill. This plague, which is never explained as to how it began, has multiplied and now the ratio of zombies to live humans is about equal.

Enter a pair of S.W.A.T. members (Ken Foree and Scott Reiniger) who have tired of hunting down these zombies. Reiniger plans on escaping the city with a friend and his girlfriend (David Emgee and Gaylen Ross), a pilot and a producer for the local TV station.
They four set off to find a safe haven and discover a world gone mad along the way, with order destroyed and hunting parties roaming the countryside.

As they fly, they come across an abandoned mall and land on the roof. Noticing the obvious pluses of taking the mall over, blocking the entranceways and staying put, they make their play. But taking out a mall filled with these creatures is not an easy task.

Blocking the doors with trucks from a nearby freight company and then dispensing of the zombies within, the four find it a home away from home. One casualty in their conquest leaves the other three enjoying the spoils of war and soon finding themselves bored.

The three reinvigorate their will to live, as Ross learns to fly the helicopter and they monitor the radio in the hopes that there are other survivors. When a call comes in they almost invite the callers, but then discover that it's only a band of marauding bikers on the move, raiding any and everything in their path. A battle ensues in which not only the bikers but the zombies reinvade the mall as well.

What has been most talked about with this film is the fact that it is more than a straight on piece of gore filled horror. Director George Romero has used the mall and the creatures as a metaphor for the mindless zombie like shoppers seen everywhere in this country, evident in today's malls as much as it was in 1978 when this film was made. Go to any mall in the land today and walk around looking at the shoppers after seeing this flick and you will be sure to see one or more characters come to life before your eyes.

While a horror movie doesn't have to rely on gore, this movie was one of the first to utilize it, garnering it an X rating had it actually been submitted. Relegated to midnight showing across the country and no newspaper advertising, it still gathered a cult following that included the likes of Roger Ebert and Gene Siskel.

The movie takes the day to day spots that we all go to each week and turns them into the most horrific of locations. With this in mind, we are put upon not in a castle or haunted house, but a shopping center that contains all that we feel we need or want. It is a well lit and mundane location, a spot where we are offered muzak and water fountains, only to have it tainted by the horrors of these creatures.
We are taken into a world filled with fear of the unknown, of a future that may not exist. And we are given a chance to look at ourselves in a different light. And at the same time, we scared to death by both what we may be and by what may happen.

'Night' of the Zombie Mallwalkers.
I revisited this film before seeing George Romero's new film, [[ASIN:B0013FZUOW Diary of the Dead]], upon its recent theatrical release. Romero is best known as the director, writer, editor and actor in his "Dead Series" of five zombie-apocalypse films (commencing with his 1968 cult classic, [ASIN:B00005Y6Y2 Night of the Living Dead]]), all of which offer his commentary on modern society. Dare I say his 1978 sequel to Night of the Living Dead surpasses the original when it comes to plot, special effects, makeup, and the use of a musical score? Set in a Pittsburgh shopping mall (the sprawling, indoor Monroeville Mall) during an apocalytic plague, the film follows four people (Francine, Stephen, Roger, and Peter) who lock themselves inside the consumer-utopia-shopping-center in an attempt to escape the ravenous undead. To date, Romero has made four sequels to his film Night of the Living Dead: [[ASIN:B0002IQNAG Dawn of the Dead]] (1978), [[ASIN:B00008G8L9 Day of the Dead]] (1985), [[ASIN:B000B2YR7Y Land of the Dead]] (2005) and most recently Romero's Diary of the Dead (2008), and has inspired countless other zombie films (including [[ASIN:B00111YM5Q 30 Days of Night]]).

This DVD edition (a must-have for any Romero fan) is lush in DVD extras: all three versions of Romero's film are included in this four-disc set: the "U.S. Theatrical Release" (the 127 minute, unrated director's cut), the Dario Argento version (the 118 minute version with more "Goblin" music), the "Extended Version" released for the 1978 Cannes Film festival (139 minutes), and a bonus disc of documentaries, all of which have been remastered and presented in 1:85 anamorphic widescreen; two noteworthy documentaries, "The Dead Will Walk" (75 minutes) and Roy Frumkes' "Document of the Dead" (92 minutes). Highly recommended

G. Merritt