That shouls be “Jake Weber is my new Hollywood crush”–I’m serious, his quiet, confident, yet modest masculinity, lean sinewy body, and smoky baritone voice make him exactly my kind of man.
I’ve already got my tickets for a show tomorrow, but something I read here bugs me, so maybe someone can expand on this a bit…
The only way for someone to become a zombie is to be infected by a zombie? People who suffer heart attacks, get hit by cars, impaled on fence posts, etc. etc. etc. don’t come back as zombies? WTF is up with that? I had already read about the “species specific” affliction (human zombies only attack/infect humans, dog zombies only attack/infect dogs, etc), but this just seems super silly. Typically, the lack of explaination is an accepted given, but if it’s this specific, I’d like to know why.
In reply to El Elvis Rojo:
[spoiler]Beats the shit out of me, bud.
In this new version, it is made very clear that death by any means other than zombie bite does NOT reactivate the corpse. It is also made clear that ANY injury inflicted via zombie mouth, no matter how small, causes death and reactivation. Small wounds can take days. Major bites, hours. Killing bites, seconds.
Like I said, this begs the question of who the first zombie was, and exactly how far spread this whole mess is. The failure of all broadcast media would seem to indicate it’s at least nationwide, complete collapse of civilization, but how the &@#%$ could it spread nationwide in one freakin’ night?
I have no answer for you, there.[/spoiler]
In other news – I am inclined to agree, for the most part, with GoBear and Plastic Virgil. It’s not as good as the original, as far as the exploration of themes, the layered feel, the introspection, the sympathy. The original was as much a psychological horror movie as a monster movie… and this one is not, for the most part.
Then again, I went in with far fewer expectations. In fact, I went in there expecting a big gory piece’a’crap. What I got was a not-bad zombie apocalypse movie.
Then again, I’ve seen what the Italians spent a decade cranking out. I have seen some truly bad zombie apocalypse movies. Perhaps I am being overgenerous.
But I think it was tryin’, and it actually made my wife scream out loud. Up until now, I thought I was the only thing that could make her do that…
Perhaps, when viewed in context with the 1979 version, that is the thematic message, that we, as a society have gone past the point of impersonalization and that we take glee in picking off people that aren’t us. We’re losing the ability to band together.
I’m not sure if I entirely buy into that, but the thought occurs to me and I can’t dismiss it out of hand. I certainly don’t think it’s empty.
Dude, it’s global in one freakin’ night. Remember the reporter in Istanbul who gets eaten?
Whoopsie. Gobear’s right. Which only confuses the issue further…
I’m really not seeing the problem on the ‘have to die from a zombie bite to become a zombie’ bit. Considering all the variations among vampire rules (silver/no silver, any sunlight/direct sunlight, garlic/no garlic) it’s not a big stretch to have this aspect in zombie films. NotLD and the original DotD never satisfactorily explained the origin of zombies either.
Maybe you’re right.
But it sticks in my craw. I’m old, now, and I tend to think in terms of “patient zero.” How did this just spontaneously erupt on all continents simultaneously?
If ALL corpses reactivate, well, problem solved. We don’t need to understand WHY.
But if only zombie bites reactivate? How’d it all go global in less than 24 hours? And wouldn’t this imply that some places are untouched?
Well, I guess it’s out of the spoiler boxes now. So in the new movie, only a zombie bite will cause you to come back as the living dead? Don’t care for that. For one thing, it will further confuse people – several times I’ve had to explain to otherwise intelligent people that, in the Romero movies, it’s not a virus or anything that spreads like a virus; it’s more that something has gone horribly wrong with the world, so that the newly dead rise as ghouls. (I think the reason for their confusion is that, in the world of Romero’s movies, zombie attacks quickly become a leading cause of death.)
I’ll still go see the movie, but I’ll also still be wishing they’d just given Romero the money for his next Dead movie instead.
True, they never satisfactorily explained what made the zombies tick, but that was another aspect of the storyline that added to the confusion and oddity of the situation the characters were involved in. There was some odd talk about radiation causing mutation in the original, and the entire purpose driving the characters in the third was to discover what was going on and how to stop it. That, I didn’t mind, because it was something that was happening worldwide, and all you knew was “People who die, for whatever reason, come back as zombies.”
When you have it so that only a zombie can spawn a zombie, there has to be an origin. One singular zombie, or possibly a group of zombies, that start the infection and spread it. That means it’s not a worldwide epidemic, unless it’s a planned out assault. If there is such a worldwide plot for world destruction, there should be some hint to it.
One other question/issue I have about the super turnaround time…say a person gets attacked by a zombie, and the zombie kills them. While the zombie’s still munching away, the person turns…does the other zombie just stop, or what? IT’d be rather embarrassing, no? I mean, first you’re just enjoying a meal, next thing you know you have to appologize to the poor bastard who’s leg you’re gnawing on.
Weren’t the original zombies in Night of the Living Dead created by a comet or some such? Maybe I’m getting that mixed up with Maximum Overdrive, but I could have sworn that’s what I saw. That being the case, I have no problem with the original zombies being animated by the space-born virus and new zombies being created by a bite.
Yes, I do count the new DotD as the sequel to the new NotLD, whether they meant for me to or not.
Ok just got back. I’m pretty mixed too. It was a fun movie… roller coaster fun. While watching I had a great time and was actually on the edge of my seat a few times. Then I got out and talked it over with my friend.
Suddenly little niggly things started to get at me and I think I see the problem.
It isn’t a Zombie film in the traditional sense it is more of a Disease film.
Because it isn’t any dead bodies but only infected dead bodies it changes the whole slant of the film.
It is more 28 days later than Dawn of the Dead. These seem more like rabid people rather than reanimated corpses.
Fast zombies also mean very few stand out.
even the shooting at the stars gallery only worked for a minute but that isn’t what we are talking about here
Instead they are just a mob. The quick cuts and blurry shots only inhance the lack of individuality. Worst of all the fast Zombies give the characters no time to have that doubt when dealing with loved ones. Only three scenes stand out and one was a throw away that looked improvized
watch Tom Savani, who above all would get it, when he stops for a second and admits that some of the bodies in the fire are people he knows. It is almost lost in the way the scene is shot as he is just on a TV screne and that moment isn’t central but damn that was what Romero was about. They are US and at the same time they are not.
There are moments of genius that seemed passed up. If anything modern could have been saterized cable news should have been. They passed up a golden oppurtunity.
The Gore was to a better standard than I was expecting considering it was a studio flick that wanted a large audience. But this was nothing compared to the ending of Dawn or even remotely in the same universe as Day of the dead.
Some of the humour worked. But did anyone else think they would have done that much better if they got Bruce Campbell to play Steve? I mean for a second I almost that it was.
Oh weird plot points I notices for a “modern” Zombie film:
Do these people not think of Cell phones or the Internet? Sheesh if this thing were going down and I was locked in a mall I’d try to log onto the SMDB and see who was left and what was going on.
I mean what difference aside from video games and style of clothes is there between the orginal and this one if they ignore the changes that have happened in the last 25 years?
Also why did they feel they had to leave the mall? They could have waited to see if the dead were going to fall apart after all they make up would lead us to believe the natural putrification processes were still going on at a normal rate.
I had a laugh at seeing so many Canadian actors in this film. Some going against type. For example The truck driving Momma was on a kids show called the Noddy Shop seeing her do her thing was hilarious.
The Father (not the old man) played Max Headroom in the 80s ('member him kids?) and of Course Polly who was a staple of Canadiana in Road to Avonlea. (sniff she’s all grown up now.)
There are also two reporters who are Entertainment reporters for CTV the who play parts on The TV as well. The one in Istabul (or where ever) I recognized and good old Dan Duran who fans of the Robocop TV series would recognize playing… what else… an anchor.
By the way any Milwalkee Dopers out there watching the film and asking themselves where the hell is this supposed to be because damn I watched and and said My goodness Milwalkee sure does look like parts of TO and Brampton.
As a stand alone film I enjoyed it, but they had to Put the Name “Dawn of the Dead” on it and ruin it. It is not a Zombie film really. It is not part of the Romero trilogy in any way and as such I will shift it over to that side of my brain where Return of the Living dead sits… enjoyable but nowhere near cannon.
You may be getting confused with King, but not necessarily Maximum Overdrive. King wrote a short story set in the Zombieverse called “Home Delivery”.
There’s also “Night of the Comet”- a fairly campy, yet surprisingly fun, zombie movie. Valley girls with machine guns- what’s not good about that?
It is implied in the original DOTD that zombies only eat warm flesh. This is specified in the novelization, where zombies WILL occasionally try to eat each other, or severed body parts… only to stop, repelled by the coldness of the flesh.
In the scene with the fat eyepatch guy on the news broadcasts in the original DOTD, this is spelled out, to some extent, but you have to be watching for it.
And yeah, I felt that it frankly heightened the sense of horror if you simply did not know why the dead were returning to life. I mean, when the dead rise, for any reason or no reason, this is a major screwup in the way the world works!
…but if only zombie bites cause reactivation… well… hell, why didn’t they try penicillin or something? I sure would. If only bites cause it, then it has to be a bug of some sort…
I think the first zombie was that patient Ana and the doctor are talking about in the very beginning in the hospital. She is wondering why the patient was moved to ICU for a simple bite.
As for the nationwide spread in one night… your guess is as good as mine.
just stopping back in to apologize for my use of the term “rawked.” I’ve never used it before and I’ll never use it again.
12 Monkeys-esque incident?
I will reiterate, after watching the original this morning.
In the original, it takes WEEKS for civilization to collapse… months, even. After several months, there are still functioning TV stations and radio broadcasters, although the quality of the programming is decidedly weird and jittery. And a few of the living are still having a hard time believing that the zombies are in fact dead people!
And this is in a situation where ALL corpses get up and walk.
I am beginning to feel that this was a pretty serious oversight on the part of the makers of the film. I mean, part of the joy of the Dead movies was the fact that they’re thought-provoking… even if the only thoughts you have are, “How could a seething undead horde get into my house, and how could I reinforce the place to stop them? Better yet, what retail centers could I reasonably conquer, reinforce, and occupy for my own safety and comfort while defending it from the living dead and my fellow humans?”
I mean, I never thought about anything after seeing a Jason movie. Or even a Freddy movie.
But ZOMBIE movies get you to THINKIN’.
Someone fumbled the ball, here…
Possible. But was the plague in 12 Monkeys a one-day thing? I thought it wiped [almost] everyone out over a period of a year or so.