Dawn of The Dead (2004) - I liked it! (unboxed spoilers)

Cafe Society
21

Chairman Pow,I thought about quoting your post and going point by point, but I’ve been up since four this morning and I’m now on cold medicine so I figure coding will not be my friend. :o

Anywho, I want to say first that the ending of SotD really doens’t matter. The movie is absolutely brilliant even if you know what is coming. If you get the chance, see it ASAP.

To expound on my problem with the bikers, I figured the mall wasn’t when they decided to start going gonzo on the zombies. They’d been doing it for a while. The mall is just when the zombies became “threatening.” Using the bikers to get the zombies into the mall seemed really thrown together.

“But how do we get the zombies into the mall? They are too slow and stupid.”

“I know! A biker gang!!” :rolleyes:

The cultural references remark was aimed at Romero. I know that nearly every movie must have some sort of relevance to the culture from which it springs. I just hate when it is tired and obvious as I felt the one in the first DotD was. It was a poorly done commentary IMHO.

I realize that a good horror movie is more than just jumping out and going boo. I just like a good story with good acting, good directing, etc. Not every movie out there has to have a deeper meaning.

Lastly, the “only go zombie when bitten” thing seemed to close to an explanation to me. It bugs me when movies, books, etc feel a need to try to explain why something mysterious is happening. I have an imagination. Let me fill out the details to my satisfaction. The bite thing also undercut the “hell being full/judgement day” scenario which is far more terrifying IMHO.

Just my $.02

22

You could well be right… but Romero’s recurring theme is that the zombies aren’t really the enemy. They’re just part of the landscape. WE are the enemy.

Our surviving three protagonists in the mall were having a tough time… but they weren’t about to kill each other.

We needed more humans for that.

23

Fun movie. Great fun! Zombies are the best.

24

I just saw the remake. I really like the fact that the bonus featurette addresses some of the questions posed in the earlier thread. I dare not allude to them, because I was poll-watching and am now too fatigued for spoiler boxes.

25

Some of the excellent extras on the DOTD Remake Director’s Cut DVD include:

*The Lost Tape: a video that Gun Shop Andy made of himself that shows what HE was doing that whole time.

*A fairly lengthy extra section featuring nothing but network coverage and news reports of the event as it was happening. Nice acknowledgements to the beginning of the original DOTD.

And I’m not spoiling a thing, here.

26

I broke down and bought the DVD today, despite the fact I don’t have the money. I really like it, but mainly because I prepped myself when I first saw it not to compare it to the original. It’s an entirely different movie, and would have been better if they chose a different title, but oh well, what are you gonna do?
The fast zombies actually worked in this film, I don’t know why. Perhaps it was the editing. The entire movie was much more fast paced than the original, and ergo, it just wouldn’t have worked wiht the slow zombies. I still like the slow zombies much better, but eh, to each their own. I don’t like the way everyone was able to make head shots on a whim, though. As has been stated, that suddenly made the threat really kinda moot. The cop and maybe CJ, I could understand, but when everyone else is just randomly pointing a gun in the direction of the hoard and making a kill shot, it’s rather ridiculous.
I have to say, they actually managed to do a pretty decent job of touchy feely parts, though. When Frank dies, it was pretty impactful. Not nearly as much as when Roger dies in the original, because we’ve only known Frank for about five minutes, but watching him push his daughter away and lie there and wait what’s going to happen…it worked.
the fact the virus or whatever only spreads by bite, though…not so good.

27

But all the classic monster/horror flicks are metaphors.

Frankenstein and his monster - technology run amuck
Werewolf - the monster inside us all
Mummies, ghouls, zombies - our basic inherent fear of death
Vampires - some of the fear of death thing, but mostly a deep desire to have a pasty complexion (okay, I can’t figure out the vampire thing.)

But a really good horror flick has got to touch on those themes, otherwise it’s just Child’s Play - bloody and dumb.

Romero and his slow zombies were chilling. The fear wasn’t from becoming a meal for the zombies, it was all the really nasty things your mind came up with during that long slow shamble before you were eaten. Chairman POW was absolutely right in his assessment of the problems with most modern “horror” films. A large body count isn’t always good. I think that only the Japanese are getting it right lately.

P.S. And in the DOTD remake, I don’t have any friends in it as zombie extras.

28

Let’s get off how subtly satirical the first one was.

They have the one throwaway line, “Some kind of instinct. Memory, of what they used to do. This was an important place in their lives.”

And then they have Zombies wandering around a mall.

Oh, very subtle. Romero sure zinged society, didn’t he? Ouch!

That first one was boring, poorly produced, poorly acted, and BOORRRRING. “Old School” boring, like nothing ever happens, and the “action” scenes have no tension or action. And too long.

This new one was boring in the way that a lot of new movies are boring. It’s just gloss on a screen. Fast moving, bloody, all kinetic energy and no context. And a little too long.

But, the new one was skillful at at times, and had some memorable scenes, like the baby-delivery scene. And I really enjoyed the interaction with “Andy”.

However, people were just WAY TOO DUMB. The first thing they do in the mall is separate to check the doors.

White boy goes into the sporting goods store, sees a bunch of motion from behind a door, and just decides to open it.

White girl’s boyfriend has jsut been attacked by a little girl who chewed out his jugular. He died, came back to life and attacked her, and she decides to give him another chance.

New one was marginally watchable. Old one was marginally unwatchable.

29

You’ll recall this line was in the remake as well. It appeared to be played for the same purpose and not just as a bit of reflexivity.

Sean, do a search for Vampire and Appeal, there was a thread not too long ago trying to determine the appeal of vampires.

30

Yeah, but no one is talking about what a great satire the new one is.

That said, I think it mostly was just to send a nod to the most famous line from the first one, not to serve the same purpose. DOTD '04 made no attempt at drawing the parallel between zombies and consumers.

The zombies filled the mall in the first one. In this one, they just milled around the parking lot until they charged in at the end.

31

Fair enough.

They filled the mall because the doors were unlocked. In the remake the doors were locked. I don’t think that this is a nitpick because when we saw the heroes escape the mall and their car overturned, there was at least one zombie shambling around (well, probably doing some practice laps before the inevitable zombie marathon) which suggests that there were still zombies hanging around places where there weren’t necessarily humans.

32

I understand the appeal, I was just trying to show that successful horror films are successful because they’re metaphors for certain archetypes that all humans share. By using them effectively within a movie, we’re all scared the same amount on a deeper level.
There are four different types of monsters, representing four different basic fears that humans have in common. These fears are on an instinctive level within our psyches, and if properly referenced during a tale, make those tales all the more scarier, more effective. Zombies and other undead (except vampires) scare us because we’re afraid that death will bring nothing. In fact, death becomes more of the same, only you’re forced to devour life just to maintain this meaningless, destructive existence.
Romero, in addition to taking shots at late '70s consumerism (which was more poignant when first released,) used this instinctive fear effectively to scare the hell out of the audience. Sure, fast zombies are scary, but how scary is it for the victim if they never see it coming? But when we in the audience knows that the victim sees this grusome death approaching, and can’t avoid it, it becomes a major event. That’s all I was trying to say, trying to support my statement that slow shambling zombies are worse than the Olympic medal winners seen in the remake.

33

It allows you to bullshit about the movie on a deeper level. The fright, creepiness, and tension you feel while watching a horror movie has nothing to do with a deeper feeling of “technology run amuck” or “our basic inherent fear of death”.

What about Shocker?

Freddy Kreuger?

Jason Vorhees?

Mike Myers?

Pinhead?

The Blair Witch?

The Exorcist?

The Shining?

Scary movies are scary due to the craft of the director, not because of the subtext of the killer.

I have a hard time believing anyone was actually scared while watching DOTD '78. I can’t really put myself in that mindset, but there’s been 100 movies since then that were all scarier than that.

Shoot, “Friday the 13th” was 1980 – only 2 years after Romero’s DOTD – and it was much scarier. Why was it scary? Because a relentless psycho was killing without apparent motive in the dark woods during the nighttime. And that’s SCARY.

34

There were horror tales long before film. All cultures have their stories that scared people when told, and they can all be boiled down into the four basic set of fears, including those that you’ve listed.

Some of the creators were more gifted than others, even between projects. I don’t think Shocker comes close to the terror that the * Elm Street* movies caused, and they were both by Wes Craven.

Completely? Of course not. But these archetypes do exist, and they help make the tales scarier. And maybe I should change the Frankenstein description to “fear of change to the status quo.” That’s a little closer to what I’m trying to describe.

These are different versions of the werewolf archetype. Normal humans that become ‘unstoppable’ killers, and strike with no reason. Stevenson’s Dr Jeckyll/Mr. Hyde is a good example.

The archetype that is represented by the Vampire, although witch or demon would work just as well. These are the monsters that are evil and supernatural, that are beyond a normal person’s ability to fight or even resist. Aliens from another world fit here too.

You call that a scary movie? Kubrick did a lot of things in that movie, but I don’t think scaring anyone was one of them.

Do you think its precursor, Night Of The Living Dead, scared most of the people who saw it on it’s first run? I know it did. We were talking about that one for weeks afterward. Subsequent movies that were scarier doesn’t detract from how it affected people when it first came out, in the absence of the later films.

Again, there’s the Werewolf rearing it’s ugly head. We just called him Jason this time. And there were a few surprise scenes, too in that one. The body coming through the kitchen window, for one. Completely unexpected action is a cinematic technique, used very effectively in the first movie. But notice how the same tricks didn’t do the job on down the line.

Look, I’m not discounting the talent of the storytellers. A hack can take a classic horror theme and turn it into dross, or even unintentional comedy (Ed Wood comes to mind.) I’m just saying that all of the truly effective horror tales are based on these four archetypes. You can’t get away from them.

35

You can also come up with any cockamamy theory that plays well with a Film Studies 101 class and shoehorn any movie into it.

36

Come up with? You give me too much credit. I’m just spreading around some facts that are commonly known within the horror genre.

Definition of archetype.

Check out the paragraph starting with "Skal also misreads …

And I got bored after the 12th page of googling “horror archetype”.

Stephen King, who is no stranger to making people drop a load in their pants (you earlier referred to his The Shining) covers these archetypes exceedingly well in his non-fiction Danse Macabre. Chapter 6, IIRC. This book was based on his class he taught at a university in Maine, and it was published about the same time his friend George Romero released DOTD.

Being scared in a movie, or a book, or beside a campfire depends on more than how the tale is told.

37

Not in the first one. That was much more like Psycho than the rest of the series.

38

Freudian (or perhaps reverse Freudian) overtones aside, I believe Sean’s point was that the transformation of a normal person into a killer is the archetype here. Especially one trying to avenge wrongs done them.

Trunk, you may want to read the Campbell books referenced* and find out that these pesky themes and metaphors are more common than you think.

  • OK, I didn’t list any books previously, but check out THE POWER OF MYTH for a good overview.
39

A multitude of eggheads saying the same thing doesn’t make it any more valid than one egghead saying it.

People make horror.

People like Joseph Campbell and academicians trade in analyzing it. Just because they come up with high-concept theories about why we’re really scared doesn’t make it so.

No. You’re spreading THEORIES that are agreed upon within the horror genre.

Boil it down a little. . .

Things are killing people. I contend that that’s scary no matter what the things are if its handled right.

You want to tell me that we’re more scared when the “things” are . .
[ul]
[li]frankenstein: we’re more scared because it taps into our fear of encroaching technology. [/li]
[li]werewolves: it taps into the fear we all have about the monster inside us all (whatever that means)[/li]
[li]mummies, ghosts, ghouls: our fear of death[/li][/ul]

You have a fancy theory there, but it can’t be tested. It can’t be disproved. It’s a shitty theory. Why?

I want to make a movie with Robots killing people. You’ll tell me, “frankenstein model.”

I want to make a “jekyll & hyde” movie, you’ll tell me “werewolf model”.

I want to make a movie with Aliens killing people, you’ll tell me “frankenstein again.”

Etc. etc.

I can’t make a point because there is always enough wiggle room in your “archetypes theory” to shoehorn any scary movie (book) into it. It’s irrefutable not due to it’s solid logical base, but rather because of it’s shoddy construction. That’s the case with a lot of literary theories.

The thing that’s staring you in the face is that unrelentless, illogical things killing people en masse is scary because you project yourself into a situation where you could die no matter what your decisions are.

Of course horror movies fit into that theory – it was created to lay on top of the horror genre. Fright can exist without that theory. That theory can not exist without the horror genre.

It’s like when you learn in 4th grade, “all conflict is about man vs. himself, man vs. man, or man vs. nature.”

Then, you go along and read any book in the world and jam it into whichever part of those “archetypes of literature” it most closely resembles.

It doesn’t make the literature any more enjoyable than your archetypes of horror make a movie any more scary.

40

I’m an engineer. I like to know the how and the why of things. If you don’t, that’s cool with me - not everyone feels like I do about things.
This whole subject has been a favorite of mine for many, many years, and I thought it could tie into the whole slow vs. fast zombie thing. I never intended to ruin your life with it.
So I’m done.