I know it seems picayune, considering how informative and thoughtful the rest of Cecil’s column is. . .
But this is technically wrong on one point:
I can’t fault Cecil for not being a fan of zombie movies, but if he wanted to use them as an example, he probably should have checked with somebody more familiar with them. As has been mentioned many times here on the SDMB, in George Romero’s zombie movies, everybody who dies of any cause – cancer, car wreck, choking on a hot dog – will rise as the flesh-eating undead (unless they’ve suffered a major brain trauma, such as blowing one’s head off with a shotgun). In these particular movies, the bite of a zombie carries a nasty infection (possibly just because walking corpses have really poor oral hygiene) which will kill the victim, but any other fatal illness would lead to the same sad end – unseemly post-mortem shambling and moaning.
Of course, anybody can make a zombie movie with whatever “rules” they wish, but the statement was specifically about the Romero films.
I have to agree, it could have been phrased much better. It was *28 Days Later * where the infection was generally spread by ‘bites and other wounds’. The Master seems to have confused his zombie flicks, a bit.
Sean of the Dead (which despite its comedic presentation, could get pretty damn scary at times) also implied the zombie-virus was spread by biting, rather than just having the unbitten dead rise (well, except for zombie zero, I assume).
I didn’t get that idea at all; it looked to me like the bite caused death (due to the nasty infection Baldwin mentions), and that death resulted in zombification. Many of the bite victims lingered for quite a while before they became zombies.
Well, that’s just the spread of the zombie infection. I just can’t recall anybody who didn’t die of zombie bites who later came back. Other films typically show people dying of gunshot wounds or crushing injuries go zombie, but that’s absent in Shaun (not “Sean” as I mistakenly wrote earlier) of the Dead. Besides, in the epilogue (showing zombies being used as reality-show fodder) there’s no indication that those dying of other causes are being affected. Rather, that the infection has been contained to the initial casualties, who are now being used for general entertainment.
Besides, if the recently dead were being zombied solely for being recently dead, you’d think there’d be a lot of elderly people staggering around in hospital gowns, figuring that that’s where most people die anyway, and younger people in hospital uniforms, reflecting the first wave of bite-victims.
And I mistakenly said “Sean” when the title character is “Shaun.” The movie is a little unusual because the bite can take a full day or more to take effect, during which the victims walk around normally complaining of little more than flu-like symptoms and headaches. Other films usually show bite victims “turning” much faster.
Patricia Tallman’s character in Night of the Living Dead (1990) had the best approach - rapidly walk past the slow-moving zombies, shoving or shooting as necessary and don’t freak out and you’ll be fine.
Maybe, but neither Night of the Living Dead nor Shaun of the Dead had any elderly zombies that I can remember. NotLD specifically mentioned a passing satellite as the suspected jump-starter of the recently dead, and SotD had a passing reference to a satellite on a TV news program as well. You would think that most of the recently dead would be elderly. For that matter, you’d think that the slow-moving zombies would have an easier time catching and biting the elderly rather than younger adults.
I still say that the large variation in the time until zombie-like symptoms appear supports the OP’s statement.
Hospitals and nursing homes would definately be the worst places to be during a zombie crisis. Even a funeral home would be safer (fewer corpses). Night had what looked like hospital patients. Zombie films rarely show child zombies either (NolD & both Dawns were exceptions). Having everyone who dies come back is much darker than having only bite victims come back.
Yep, I’ve always liked (if that’s the right word) George Romero’s dark vision; if it spread like an epidemic it would be almost understandable, but in his movies, the world has simply . . . changed. Why? Nobody knows. Maybe God’s tired of our bullshit.
Well, it’s Hallowe’en night. Got a Netflix DVD called Feast to watch, then maybe I’ll put in the 1990 remake of Night of the Living Dead, which I actually like better than the original. Sweet dreams, everybody!
In the Resident Evil games and films, Zombie-ism is caused by a virus and is spread though bites and wounds inflicted by the walking dead. As such, Cecil’s conclusions seem valid at least for this subset of the undead.
Yeah, but Cecil said “Judging from the Romero oeuvre, zombie infection is spread by bites and other wounds.”
Of course, bites and other wounds causing death result in zombification, so what Cecil said wasn’t wrong…exactly, just misleading, and invoking Romero wasn’t the best example to demonstate the point. In the Romero films, all Dead become Zombies, bitten or not.