George Romero recently released a new zombie movie, Survival of the Dead.
I checked Box Office Mojo. Its total worldwide box office has been $136,785.
The weird thing is that it’s apparently not a bad movie. Among the people who did see it and rated it, almost half gave it an “A”.
So how did it do this bad? You’d think Romero’s name would draw in a decent amount of people. Zombies are still popular. I wouldn’t have expected a hundred million dollar blockbuster but you’d think it would have at least hit the ten million dollar mark.
Well crap, there are no theaters in the state of Florida playing the movie. Maybe it is an extremely limited release. That would account for the low take at the box office.
The odds were against you. While it’s officially still in theatrical release, in reality it’s only playing in ten theatres. (Which is actually an improvement; last week it was only playing in eight.)
I saw it a few weeks ago for free on HDNET Movies. It had a couple of interesting ideas, but overall I thought it was pretty bad. (I like the original *Dead *trilogy, but I thought Land of the Dead sucked and I haven’t seen Diary of the Dead.) Survival of the Dead looks and feels very much like a bad weekend Syfy movie. YMMV.
Want a treat? He also made a great film called Two Evil Eyes around 1990 or so, which few people have seen.
It’s one of those “anthology” horror movies, but only two parts. One part is by him and the other part is by Italian director Dario Argento (which is really good too, and stars Harvey Keitel). Both segments are based on Edgar Allan Poe stories. Check it out!
That was exactly my impression. I’m pretty forgiving when it comes to horror movies, but I found it almost painful to watch. I had to whip out my old copy of Dawn Of The Dead just to get rid of the taste.
I am a gigantic Zombie fan. Even though they’re a bit campy now, the original Dawn of the Dead and Day of the Dead are great, and Night of the Living Dead is a classic.
I even kind of liked Land of the Dead, though it took quite a bit of suspension of disbelief.
Diary of the Dead, while a good idea, and fun, was bad.
Survival of the Dead was…
It wasn’t even that enjoyable.
I think Romero’s good days are behind him. And I hate saying that, as a big fan. Allegedly, Gunn is working on another Zombie movie, and if it is as big a hit as Dawn '04, I will cheerfully give him the Zombie King crown.
It was released in the UK on DVD, then on US on OnDemand PPV, then a “why bother” US theatrical release.
Movie wasn’t horrible, but not anything special either. Trying to get zombies to eat alternative food sources seems weird when back in Night they would eat anything that moved. Yeah, reboot, whatever, still seems weird.
I liked Diary better than Land, this one I’m not sure where I’d place. Certainly well below the original 3.