Day 2: Dawn of the Dead, Director's Cut (1978)

"What are they doing? Why do they come here?"

"Some kind of instinct. Memory of what they used to do. This was an important place in their lives."

-Fran and Stephen

Starring: David Emge, Ken Foree, Scott Reiniger, Gaylen Ross
Directed By: George A. Romero
Trailer: "The night of the Living Dead has ended. The Dawn of the Dead begins..."



Premise: In the middle of a zombie apocalypse, four survivors steal a helicopter and take refuge at a mall overrun by the undead.

My familiarity with this movie: I absolutely love Night of the Living Dead when I saw it about ten years back, and I watched this film back in...2012 or 2013 for this project. I felt like it'd been a while since I'd seen it, so I gave it another go.

Notes, opinions, general thoughts (beware of spoilers):

• Apparently "Dead Rising" is officially NOT inspired by this movie. Even though, y'know, it totally is. C'mon, now.
• The zombie being partially decapitated by the chopper blades was supposed to be foreshadowing for the film's ending, where Peter (via gunshot) and Fran (via helicopter blades) commit suicide. Said ending was changed due to a more hopeful one, though.
• I dig the more comedic, colorful, but yet still dark tone of the film compared to its predecessor.
• Tom Savini wasn't fond of the bluish-grey color of the zombies' skin, nor the bright red of their blood, but Romero liked it, feeling it made the film more comic book-like. Not surprising that he went with it, since he was a huge fan of the old E.C. horror comics.
• Home video copies of this film are ridiclously hard to find nowadays, due to it being out of print. I bought my DVD on eBay, but it turned out to be a Korean bootleg. It's not bad, as bootlegs go, though. It has screenshots of zombie!Roger, though. So, y'know, spoiler alert.
• I almost had the chance to meet Scott Reiniger a few weeks back, at the ScareFest, but alas, I didn't get to.
• If Ken Foree's Peter seems familiar, and you keep wanting to call him "Roger" (even though that's Reiniger's character), you probably watched "Kenan & Kel" often (I know I did), where Foree played Kenan's dad, Roger.
• The "cigarette" scene is pretty funny, though it's apparently not in the Theatrical Cut.
• Gotta say, not a fan of Stephen's character at first.
• The zombie kids running for Peter is interesting in the context of the other zombies being slow and shambling
• I remember Roger being bitten on the leg from my previous viewing, but not WHEN it happened. So, there's a few scenes where the dead are reaching for his leg, and I keep thinking "this is it!"...but it's not. Unintentional foreshadowing. Neat!
• Fran handles herself very well for a pregnant lady against the hordes of the undead. Apparently, this is due to Gaylen Ross not wanting to scream when directed to do so by Romero, feeling the character was stronger and more capable than that. Romero agreed, and didn't ask her to scream again.
• Roger saying "One stop shopping! Everything you need, right at your fingertips," was a line that really stuck in my head after my first viewing, for some reason.- The Monroeville Mall has bumpers on the escalator after the movie so people wouldn't try to slide down it like Roger did (which was improvised by Reiniger).
• According to my research, the theatrical cut has less of the survivors just...living their life in the mall. Which is unfortunate, since those are great scenes. Like Stephen and Fran's dinner.
• Stephen crossed over to likable a while back...but then he makes a dumb move and is killed.
• While it might seem strange for a mall to have a gun store nowadays...it wasn't common back then, either. The gun store wasn't part of the Monroeville Mall, and the scenes featuring it were shot elsewhere.

The Tally of Terror:

• 93 dead bodies: 17 human, and 76 zombies
• Not gonna count the undead bodies.
• 2 survivors
• CUTIE ALERT: Fran
• dozens of bikers
• "thousands" of zombies
• 1 mall
• decapitations
• gunfire
• Truck-Fu
• 1 racist cop
• several exploding heads
• 1 mention of the word "zombie"
• 1 wheelbarrow gurney
• lots of muzak
• 1 candlelit dinner
• 1 skating rink
• 3 versions of the film (Theatrical, Director's, Argento)
• 2 montages

Best scare: The entire sequence in the projects at the beginning

The Good:

• The four protagonists are all likable, sympathetic people. And the character arcs they undergo are fascinating, going from fear, to hoplessness, to hedonism, to complacency...very engaging stuff.
• The satiric themes are just as relevant now as they were in the late 70s. Possibly moreso.
• The meandering pacing of the plot does a lot for helping immerse the viewer into the world and situation. It really does feel like months have passed. I feel it's why I probably wouldn't like the faster, more action-oriented Argento Cut as much.
• While Tom Savini may disagree, I dig the comic book-inspired visual style of the zombies. It's just...more visually interesting, to be honest.

The Bad:

• The slower-paced plot may bore some viewers (though that's sorta the point)
• The aforementioned satiric themes are very heavy-handed, and practically spelled out by the characters. Not much in the way of sublety here.

Conclusion: It's an absolute classic, and for very good reason. It's essential viewing for anyone interested in zombie fiction, and certainly a masterpiece of the horror genre. Likable characters, a fun, tense, and tragic story, with social commentary that stands up today. Recommended.