Day of the Dead (1985)

For me, associations of "El Día de los Muertos."
For me, the title of George A. Romero's third "Living Dead" movie brings with it associations of "El Día de los Muertos," the November 1st and 2nd holiday observing the dead, in which humans attempt to coexist with the dead at least for a day. Although many fans of his first two films were disappointed with this film, Romero has said that Day of the Dead is his personal favorite among his original three zombie films. I revisited this film before seeing 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 this 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? It chronicles yet another zombie assault, this one on an underground military establishment (the film satirizes the military mindset along the way.) What distinguishes this film in the series is that Romero actually casts a zombie character ("Bub") in a leading role to illustrate that zombies and humans are not so very different, which also suggests that the biggest threat to humanity isn't the ravenous zombies, but the humans (especially those suffering from Captain Rhodes-like military madness). 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]]). Day of the Dead is among my Romero personal favorites, and is highly underrated, deserving critical reconsideration. Highly recommended.

G. Merritt

Interesting sequel to Romero's previous zombie movie.
"First there was Night of the Living Dead then Dawn of the Dead and now the darkest day of horror the world has ever known." BAH! Don't believe the hype ladies and gentlemen. I think Romero should have quit while he was ahead. While the idea behind Day of the Dead seems to demand this final chapter instead you get a dose of potential smothered in the same clichéd characters and subplots that bring this film down to being nothing more than just another zombie movie.

I'll admit this. The concept is interesting and if there were more thought put into the whole "finding a cure to the zombie infestation" theme. There was even some interesting scientific discovery, though it's really not anything that wasn't already touched upon in the previous movie. In the end the movie doesn't really collect on its promise in this department. What you do get is the same sort of thing you got from the last movie. Zombies all around you while you seal yourself inside something to keep them out. Only this time it's some haphazard underground military installation (with a fleet of Winnebegos?), but that doesn't matter because the zombies do get in and everything runs amok. Not exactly a departure from the previous two films. The only thing diverse in this film is the inclusion of the zombie Bub, which was actually interesting even if the plot device was technically useless (then again if they didn't have Bub there wouldn't be much of a script at all).

The characters, just about all of them, are flat in spite of an attempt to draw in some dimension to them. The same actor could have played all the military personnel since they all acted the same. The new leader of the installation, Captain Rhodes is written like a cartoon bad guy with hardly any real motivation for his asinine behavior. The other main characters are either just something to carry the plot or just plain two-dimensional. While some characters do show a little depth that depth usually ends up being a small footnote in regards to how they are played out. Just about the only truly interesting character is our buddy Zombie Bub. It's sad when the apparently mindless monster ends up being the only three-dimensional character in the entire movie.

Is it scary? In a word... no. You do get some creepy scenes but nothing that will make you run scared. You also (of course) get a really nice dose of gory scenes, which is a trademark for this series. Most of the zombies were done well in the makeup department, but that is to be expected. The music starts off kinda eerie but then ends up being more like any other cheesy 80's synth-pop soundtrack found in many B-movies of the time. The acting is mostly overdone with the bad humans hamming it up so much I was expecting them to twirl their moustaches and snicker about tying some girl on the railroad tracks. The protagonists fare a little better, but not by much. I will give Joe Pilato a little credit for doing the best he could with the script handed to him. Richard Liberty also had some good scenes. The top actor by far though has to be Sherman Howard who plays, you guessed it, Bub the Zombie.

Do yourself a favor, watch this one and ignore the remake
Welcome to the would-be last movie to show the evolution of the zombie. Finally, we see what happens to humans when zombies rule the world. Like Dawn of the Dead, Day shows you the horrors that is human nature. I highly recommend it to a serious zombie fan.