| Day Of The Dead (1985) |
| Directed by George A. Romero. Starring Lori Cardille, Terry Alexander, Joe Pilato, Jarlath Conroy, and Richard Liberty. |
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| Day Of The Dead is the third movie in George Romero's Dead trilogy, and from the appearance of the now badly decayed zombies we can assume that the story takes place at least a year or two after Dawn Of The Dead. This time, we meet a new group of survivors. A military/scientific team holed up in a fortified underground military installation. |
| As the movie begins, four members of the team are flying over a deserted city in Florida looking for survivors. They touch down in a car park despite protests from the pilot John, and use a megaphone to try and contact anyone who's still alive. After a few moments, the eerie silence is broken by the moans of the living dead emerging from their hidey holes. Even a zombie gator clambers down the steps of a building. |
| Needless to say, the four are back in the air quicker than Adam Sandlers career fizzled, and they return to the complex. When they arrive, they find that the team leader Major Cooper has died , and the highly irritable Lt. Rhodes ( played by Joe Pilato, who was a cop in Dawn Of The Dead) is now in command. |
| The complex also has a corral where zombies are kept to be hacked up in scientific experiments to find a solution to the problem. The tension between the scientists and the soldiers is building every day as the soldiers become disillusioned about the lack of progress. This section of the film is considered too talky for some , but it adds much needed characterisation, more information about the unusual phenomenon , and helps to emphasise the regular Romero theme of lack of co-operation and its consequences. |
| We also meet Logan , a scientist who has been not too affectionately dubbed 'Frankenstein' by his peers. Frankenstien believes that the living dead can be trained to be civilised instead of eating people. His star pupil is Bub , a zombie he's trained to shave, read, use a telephone, and even to use a pistol. Logans research does little other than infuriate Lt. Rhodes , and not only do things become volatile between the military and the scientists, but a suicidal soldier lets hordes of the undead into the complex making for a gore soaked finale. |
| A lot of Dawn Of The Dead fans were disappointed with this movie , but it was the first Romero film I'd ever seen as a 13 year old, and it got me hooked and eager to check out other George Romero movies such as Martin. The sequence in the Florida city is incredible. I don't know how such a low budget movie was able to clear out such a wide area and set dress it so well. The scenes revolving around the corral were also good , and gave this a great deal of tension. The special effects by Tom Savini were both impressive and realistic. |
| Although a lot of people didn't like the huge amount of dialogue , it was well delivered by competent actors and gave the film an extremely realistic feel. If you're easily offended by swearing, then this is one to avoid because it takes on Scarface head to head in the swearing stakes. The whole thing was very dark and moody , and it was certainly good to see a movie filmed in a real missile silo. The only real downside to this is the seemingly hurried ending... a bit of a letdown after the explosive finale where Rhodes and his men fight off hordes of hungry zombies. Still , I like it almost as much as Dawn Of The Dead, and like Dawn it's also loaded with social commentary. |
| Entertainment : 4 out of 4 |
| Watchability : 4 out of 4 |
| Overall : 4 out of 4 |
| Reviewed by Blake |
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| SECOND OPINION - by Deadite Dave |
| I'll keep it short and sweet. Zombies, guns, missile silos, gore aplenty.....what more could you ask for? Hey, it ain't Dead Alive or Evil Dead 2, but it's zombies for chrissakes! Less chatter and I'd have given it a perfect score! |
| Entertainment : 3 out of 4 |
| Watchability : 4 out of 4 |
| Overall : 3.5 out of 4 |