"Survival of the Dead" Review
Can the zombies survive after the shit-fest that was "Diary of the Dead"?
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The Cinema Snob: "Survival of the Dead" Review
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Good or bad, I'm still going to go see it.
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I actually like "Diary of the Dead". I don't know why people say its a bad movie.
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Because it's a bad movie. Really bad. One of the few movies i really wanted to walk out on.
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well, that sure cleared it up, mr.jimmy bob
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I just can't grasp how people dislike Diary of the Dead... For me it's really two simple reasons...
1. Amish Sam. Come on now, from beginning to his end this character was one of the most memorable in any series. A deaf Amish guy who uses Scythes and dynamite against the undead?
2. Lord Badass (as we have named him). The Drama Teacher, name non-remembered. He is an older, more bitter Ashley Williams. Guns get taken away? He uses bow and arrow. That gets lost? Swords. He is a walking figure of machismo...
I don't know, the rest, well it's blah at best, but those two character redeem it in spades to me.
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Good review. What did you think of the original Night Of The Living Dead? you don't mention your opinions on it. Just out of curiosity.
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I love "Night of the Living Dead," it's creepy as hell. I also really like the remake too.
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Quote of the day: "Fucking Diary of the Dead...fucking christ, man."
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Personally, I think Romero dropped the ball when he decided that instead of a zombie movie with some social context, he wanted to make movies with a social context with zombies.
As I read this, you're talking about how you side with the .mil, and that is an important part of what went wrong with Romero. Maybe its just how I see things, but I think Romero increasingly wanted us to sympathize with the undead. Land did it with the "Don't shoot those zombies, they are just trying to survive" scene. Diary brought us the Zombie-Crying-Blood scene where a character questions who the bad guys are, them or the zombies.
Wrong, wrong, wrong. Zombies are a force of nature that can't be reasoned with, you can only survive them if you're smart. (Tangentially, this reason is why I think the zombie mythos evolved away from Romero-style zombies; losing to them requires the survivors to be in love with the Idiot Ball. Losing to speedier Infected-style zombies is easier to understand).
By making zombies into a form of social commentary, Romero has wound up doing the most horrible thing in a zombie movie: humanizing the undead.
I'm rambling, so... there you go.
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I like how you said humanizing the undead. I remember seeing the commercial for DAWN OF THE DEAD as a child during saturday WWF midnight wrestling and it used to creep me out big time due to the zombies having an aura of absolute purified evil which was so inhuman it feasted on living flesh. When i saw DAY OF THE DEAD i was very interested in seeing how the Bub character would evolve. I was hoping Bub would manifest this deep instinctive dread as a very unnatural anti-hero abomination which brought horrifying nightmarish death to the bad guys.Unfortunately it was a slight let down when the other zombies ripped apart and consumed the villains instead of Bub. So yes maybe Mr.Romero needs to bring back the monster the force of Death from the previous installments. At the moment the zombies themselves dont scare me since they seem more like victims and i watch the movies more for the great social commentaries.
By the way i love DIARY OF THE DEAD
Thanks Cinema Snob for not holding back. I dont know if i could be as brave with one of my favorite genres.
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Saw it at the Seattle Film Festival and just down right hated it. I'm sure I would of enjoyed it a little had I seen it at home, drunk, with a bunch of friends, but seeing it in the theater for $11 was torturous.
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Such irony... the guy who made the three best zombie films of all time is ripping off himself and not doing a good job of it.
I barely remember "Diary." I didn't think it was a terrible movie, I just thought it was boring, and couldn't detect much love from behind the camera. I don't know, maybe Romero just keeps doing these because he's gotta pay the bills, and his heart isn't really in it. I heard he's got plans to make more in this recent series... it's be nice to think he's still got one masterpiece left in him.
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I actually gave up on Ramero after 'Land of the Dead' .... Zombies using guns is, IMO, ridiculous. I haven't seen Diary but from what I've heard, it's shit...so I have no desire to. 'Survival' sounds pretty bad too....what happened to Ramero?!
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I am such a Romero Mark I love all of the Dead Movies. Its your opinion. But I loved it. The Soundtrack should have no been put in.
So love me hate or whatever. I respect your opinion but I can't Agree with it. I thought Survival of the Dead was one of his best in years. Land of the Dead I thought it was done right I mean its not like the were reloading the guns. I thought there were done right. You had to like the opening scene of it. It was awesome.
But Romero is my favorite director so call me biased. The army guy was also in the Land of the Dead. But I remeber seeing Land in theaters it was fucking awesome.
So please don't hate me I am just huge Romero fan. He is one the few horror pioneers still doing what he loves so you gotta respect that. So anyways I have said my piece let the flaming come. Maybe a few people will agree. But Survival was very good like I said it was one of his best in a while.
Oh and sorry to get off subject Brad. But for a future Snob review you should find the movie Octaman. A movie Rick Baker probably wishes didn't exist.
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Night of the Living Dead (68) is my favorite movie of all time. I thought the remake in 91 was very well made.
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i love your review normally
but FUCK YOU i love diary of the dead
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I've not heard a single good thing about this from any reviewer I trust.
DIARY OF THE DEAD sucked a fat cock.
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I saw this at TIFF and at the time, sitting in the same theatre as Romero made it seem fucking awesome. Now that you remind me of it though, yeah, it wasn't great...
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To paraphrase another internet personality: "Those who hate the Diary of the Dead Spinoff will not be swayed by Survival of the Dead. Those who love it have already seen it, written a thesis on it and are now standing outside my house trying to figure out which window to break."
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I would cut his head off that kids head off with my Grand Funk Railroad "On Time" record.
Man, i fucking hated this movie . I wanted to like Diary of the Dead too, but i couldn't! ohso fucking lame.
And thank you, i loved the uncut version of Land of the Dead(except for the technological advancements... they never really set up when Land takes place.. is it between Day and Dawn or after Day? Are we to assume that Riley invented all this shit? And if so how come he is not living it up in Fiddler's Green? He would be Kaufman's left hand man! blah).
And yes, the CGI gore was lame! I hate the fake blood ! That's what ruined Dead Snow for me too.
You forgot to mention how this movies does answer what happens if you get zombie blood/finger in your mouth. You turn and your gay solider, who you want to fuck for 5 minutes, buddy will have to shoot you.
Good review! Zombie 2 rules(best splinter through the eyball ever)!
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Tom Savini said in an interview that "Land" takes place 2 years after "Day".
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oh, ok. Machete zombie knew when it took place, not me. fuck.
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Dear God I hated Diary of the dead, every God forsaken second of it, however Survival of the dead I will see with a fresh perspective by putting my hatred for that movie in the back for a while.
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Diary of the Dead was an ok movie, it had it's moments. The zombie pool was an awesome visual! But the bad acting and ridiculous dialogue overshadow all the good parts. As for Survival... What the hell was that shit!?! I'm sad for Romero... Anyway, all this talk about Nightmare City, or as I prefer, La Invasion de los Zombies Atomicos, got me wanting to pop it in my dvd and watch it tonight
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Speaking of zombies Brad, are you looking forward to AMCs 'The Walking Dead' series?
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When you were talking about the annoying kid, and talk about how they wrote it as if they didn't even know that the kid was annoying, that is word for word how I feel about Vincent Vega from Pulp Fiction. He ruins every scene he is in, and he's the main character. Make the film about Sammy J and Bruce Willis, and it'll be good. Through in Tarantino and Travolta, then it's just annoying. Then have some extremely flawed logic, and you've summed up how awful Pulp Fiction is.
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This is a movie in which a zombie chick rides a horse...I'll repeat that...A zombie chick RIDES a fucking HORSE! That's as bad as the 'vegetarian zombie' in the Day of the Dead remake. And Romero was pissed about running zombies in the Dawn of the Dead remake...and yet you have shit like this.
Romero...you either need to retire or step away from the zombie genre. Diary of the Dead and then this? For shame George...for shame.
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Cinema Snob, the kid's name is Devon Bostick. Don't expect him to go anywhere anytime soon. You know why? His mother is a Casting Director in Canada. She's the Casting Director for the Saw films and he's in Saw 4 & 6. He was annoying as shit in Saw 6. When studios make movies in Canada, they use the same actors over and over again. So, this annoying kid is going to be getting more work and we can't stop it.
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Also, he's Ezio Auditore blah blah Firenze.
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Seems like the only reason to watch this film is to see a horse get eaten by a bunch of zombies. Disturbingly offensive? Yes. That's why it should be in a horror film. It would also make perfect sense because why would the zombies only eat human flesh? I guess its a rule.
But based on what I heard I never plan to watch this film. The bad outweighs the good by all accounts.
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Nice review. I'm rather thankful of the heads up of the zombies eating horse thing. I watch quite a few horror films but I'm always wary of any that involve an animal getting harmed.
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you have the worst taste in horror movies
for god sake you liked the crapfest Cabin Fever 2 and the awful Nightmare on Elm Street remake --- jesus man
diary of the dead was really good -- YOU HAVE POOR TASTE!!!!!!!
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No, people who shelve out money and give high praise to PG-13 slasher flicks and prefer the Dawn remake to the original have poor taste in horror films. We just have different opinions on three horror films that at best don't even matter in the long run. And I hated the first Cabin Fever.
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Dude i hate to point this out, but it's HIS taste not yours. Although on Diary I think you'll find more people side with him than you; the simple fact is diary was BORING the characters were annoying(aside from the few side characters like he said), also if he wanted to do the gimmick that he did in Diary of the Dead he should of left it without music, without the god awful narration and just let the mood set itself kinda like Rec. did, but he didn't and therefore it failed the gimmick
But, that is my opinion. Not yours if you don't like it you don't
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Man, Romero. You used to actually give a rat's ass for this franchise. I've been hesitant about Survival ever since I first heard about it. I hated Diary, and the things I'm hearing about Survival don't sound too good...
And just from hearing about the film from this review, I can safely say Zombi 2 automatically kicks more ass than this flick.
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God damn i hated diary i mean i'm not a big fan of zombies from the get go but just like you said the gimmick of the camera takes you out of it and honestly these kids would actually be the first ones dead because their stupid as shit. I honestly don't know what happened to Romero but I think it was because alot of people really started pushing the whole 'his movies are a smart satire' and while that is true someone probably got into his ear and said 'you know this is what you should do' and so he did
Speaking of zombie movies Brad I've asked you this on twitter but have you seen Zombies Anonymous? Cause I'd like to know your take on it if you did
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I forget that Romero is still making movies. It was the mediocre to bad "Land of the Dead" that caused this strange director specific amnesia.
How many of you Romero fans have seen "Knightriders?" It's the fucking movie that never ends. You'd think he could only milk the concept of jousting Ren Faire motorcyclists for about 75 minutes. But, no. You're in for 145 minutes of biker dudes who take their Ren Faire really fucking seriously.
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Ok, somehow that sounds hillariously good. But I'm still going to stay away from it, unless it has a line like "You good sir must surrender your chopper"....wait...no not even if it had that
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George is trying to remake his original cannon as if it happens now. I think this is the mistep as his original cannon was great. Land was good, I wish Romero would go to back to making political allegories, that is what he is good at. Romero zombie flicks are usually are about o,methign and recently he seems to be dealing with culture he is not sure of, in diary it was about you tube and facebook and the instant knowledge and uploading. Survivial maybe about the iraq war, knowing romero i would not bet against it.
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to be honest i found it very interestig as tell the story... girls masturbing, domestic zombies in a small comunity, this looks cool!
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Both Diary of The Dead and Survival of the Dead are infinitely better than the Dawn of the Dead remake.
Survival of the Dead is not up there with Romero's best work. But it is still a good low budget movie and pure genius compared with other recent zombie films. I like the fact that it deals with feuding families and patriarchal dysfunction. It's, as far as a Zombie film can be' a "mature" work by a veteran film maker. If Sam Peckinpah or John Ford had made a zombie film, they would have made something like Survival of the Dead. The main problem is the CGI gore is no substitute for Tom Savini
And to the guy who asked. I've seen Knightriders, its a bit long and not my kind of thing. But it was an attempt to make a human interest drama about weekend warriors. It was in the mold of those 1970s films about washed up rodeo riders. It gets fairly respectable reviews outside of horror circles. My dad likes knightriders.
Amd please Cabin Fever is an awful film. Cabin Fever 2 is good.
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I don't think "Knightriders" is that bad of a film. I think it's certainly a bizarre experience for anyone who equates Romero with zombies, though. Well, it's really just a very long and a very strange movie, period.
I think the zombie genre can be more mature and more intelligent and taken more seriously than it has. Example: "Pontypool."
"Fido" is rather good too, if a little sillier. (Maybe we should Canadians take over making zombie films?)
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(Maybe we should *let* Canadians take over making zombie films?)
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Not seen Fido, but Pontypool is one of the increasingly rare good ones. Some people would dispute that it was a zombie film because the carriers are not dead. I liked it much more than the Crazies remake. That film missed the point of the original, which was that Trixie victims didn't know they were crazy.
What I meant by mature was that Survival of the Dead is an old timers movie. It's a fitting film for a man in his 70s to make, terse, grumpy, laconic. And come on the competition for zombie films is low these days. They're mostly either comedies or speed-zombie disease movies. I'm an unashamed fan of Romero, so I'm pleased he's still making stuff.
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Unfortunately the CGI gore takes away from any old school feeling this movie would bring. But I am glad too that he's still making movies. In no way do I think that Romero has "lost it" like some have suggested. I think Diary was terrible, and Survival was so-so, but that doesn't mean the next one can't be good. Here's hoping it is.
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Hi, Brad, thanks fo the reply,
I try not to think about the CGI, but it does drag the film down.
And I'm with you on Dawn of the Dead 2004. It's like remaking The Good, The Bad and The Ugly as a tv mini-series with a generic soundtrack.
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The 2004 Dawn of the Dead wasn't bad at all. It wasn't even a remake, they should never have used that title in the first place.
Most recent zombie movies seem to be very serious (28 Days Later, REC) or comedy (Shaun of the Dead, Zombieland), but Dawn of the Dead managed to be somewhere in the middle. Plus, it starred Sarah Polley.
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Survival of the dead debuted early on my 360. I know it wasn't worth 1600 points so i didn't bother lol.
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Well I didn't really hate diary and survival I do agree that they are forgettable movies compared to say dawn and day.
If you want to rinse the bad taste of this movie I'd reccomend Zombies of Mass Destruction.
Oh and worst zombie of the decade? Nah just watch the remake of day of the dead...
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I strangely agree and disagree with you. While ultimately both our opinions are that the the film is "ok." I honestly think that someone COULD make this cannon work. The whole horse eating thing shows an evolution in the zombies much like what we saw in day of the dead when that one zombie starts to become domesticated. The fact that the zombies now eat other meats tells us that domestication is possible. This could then be a stepping stone for some really interesting and original zombie material.
In terms of plot line and dialogue this film certainly is weak and I must say my suspicion is that it is that way because the film is much more independent than his earlier films. Romero, like any good creator needs restrictions. If you're able to do whatever the fuck you like you're going to end up with something that just doesn't work. You need something that keeps your whole original idea in focus and keeps you wanting to improve it,
and my honest to goodness opinion is that if Romero sat down and did another draft or two of the screenplay we wouldn't be here berating this film but rather we would be praising it as a film worthy of the original quadrilogy. Couple this with the fact that the original films had gaps of about 10 years between them and now he seems to just want to continuously shit them out it's no surprise that Romero hasn't been thinking properly about his films and looking at them from every possible angle. I hate to say it but Romero is past his prime, he needs to hand his title of horror master to someone else who can bring a new and interesting angle to the of the dead name.
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Romero is in his 70s. The only films he can get backing for are his zombie movies. So, like any artist working within commercial restraints and who still has an urge to create, he makes the films he can make.
Diary of the Dead was a picaresque: a series of branching stories held together by a journey.
Survival of the Dead is a film about ranchers and their families trying to civilise a new frontier. The soldiers are like gunslingers riding into town and getting caught up a turf war. The irritating youngster is like the annoying would-be gun-fighter in any number of cowboy films.
It's a zombie film that harks back to westerns and oaters, not a real continuation of Romero's other zombie films. Basically, Survival of the Dead is a slightly grumpy old-timers movie.
Intead of picking it to bits, enjoy it as a pretty good B-picture from a director in his twilight years.
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Brad- Thanks again for trudging through bad movies so I don't have to. I remember going to see Land of the Dead in the theater. I had to psych myself up to dare myself to see it because I was sure that I would scare the living daylights out of me. However, it did not. It was just a silly, dull movie. There is something about zombie apocolpys movies that I just love. I don't know what it is. It's the same feeling you get from reading Day of the Triffid. Or wondering what the world would be if an influenze epidemic ravaged the nation. It was the strange frightend feeling I felt on Sept 11th and a few days after. It's also the feeling you get from watching the first two nights of The Stand mini-series. The second two night not so much and the ending STUPID. Really? The Hand-of-God is your big Duece Ex Machina? Are you kidding me?
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Thanks for the review; I will definitely Netflix this one when the time comes. Another reason why I'm glad that I signed up with Netflix: having seen the first four DEAD movies (I saw LAND OF THE DEAD in the theater 5 years ago!), I think a rental (or a stream, if I'm so inclined) would be the best option to see this one. Speaking of LAND OF THE DEAD, RIP Dennis Hopper, you will be sorely missed. "Zombies man, they freak me out."
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I'm a huge fan of George A. Romero and the majority of zombie lore in general, but ya, I have to agree, Diary of the Dead was absolutely HORRIBLE, the only really redeeming part in my eyes was when they go to the women's dorms and there's a dude stealing shit, I fuckin love that guy. But ya, I'm glad you reviewed this, I was very unsure of whether or not to see it in theaters but I'll take your advice. And the special effect gore confused me, was Tom Savini attached to this movie? If so then man, that's depressing, he should know better than to use computer graphics for his gore.
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gotta be honest, i really liked diary of the dead for the most part and dont really understand alot of the criticism people give it. The only real thing i agree with is that the main young character in it arnt all that likable but it seemed to me like it was going back to the night of the living dead. low budget, experementing with things romero hasnt really done before with the way it was shot. I dont think that agree with the comment about if it didnt have romeros name on it everyone would be in agreement about how bad it is. there were some very good shots in it, the actors did a pretty good job all round, even though it had a b movie budget the acting and directing was far from b movie standards. i will say though that after diary and survival the romero should keep clear of writing parts for teens and young characters. maybe its his view of them or of the modern world but hes younger characters just seem unlikeable and feel like they were writen by someone who is out of touch and that really showed with the young guy in survival, although just about all the other characters in survival i thought were writen pretty well and there wasnt an outright evil or an outright good in it . as a fan of all the old skool movies i share your view on the cgi too. cgi is fine if its used subtly but some of it in survival is really, really bad.
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Do you know Romero is planning to remake Dario Argento's Deep Red?
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What? That mother fucker! Romero hasn't made a good movie since Day of the Dead. It's bad enough that Argento has been sucking it up lately, The Mother of Tears was horrible, but Romero needs to keep his hands off Deep Red! If you can't make anything original, fucking retire.
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Yes it is true. Plus to add even more insult to injury, Romero plans to ruin Argento's masterpiece by filming it in 3-D! ... I think I just upchucked in my mouth after bringing that news of atrocity to light.
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I weep, oh how I weep...
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How would that work? Nothing in the original Deep Red really made me want it to pop out at my face, so why does Romero think he should make his remake even more gimmicky? Bastard.
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http://lbn.threat.tv/jarsquatter.swf
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...Why?
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At the camp they 'find' the money truck, with the keys and are surprised to find a shit load of cash still in the safe. Was quite a big scene too, but totally compromised by the annoying - walking hit me sign- of a kid character with his wondrous iPhone.
Totally agree with your rocking analysis. It has some cool ideas but just done very cheap. CGI fire is the lamest, ugliest, useless thing ever... :S
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This is the first time I have commented on any of your videos Brad but I have been a follower of your work for the past year or so. Dawn of the Dead is my favourite Romero movie out of all of the Dead series, and most of the 25(ish) zombie flicks I have. I feel that Romero knows that after Land of the Dead, the series was going downhill, and I feel that he is trying to end the series altogether, albeit in a very poor, un-Romero like way. I didn't mind Diary of the Dead, but Survival of the Dead could have been much better. And to think I spent £10 on it at Morrison’s...
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This is the first time I have commented on any of your videos Brad but I have been a follower of your work for the past year or so. Dawn of the Dead is my favourite Romero movie out of all of the Dead series, and most of the 30(ish) zombie flicks I have. I feel that Romero knows that after Land of the Dead, the series was going downhill, and I feel that he is trying to end the series altogether, albeit in a very poor, un-Romero like way. I didn't mind Diary of the Dead, but Survival of the Dead could have been much better. And to think I spent £10 on it at Morrison’s...
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Um Mr brad? Can you get rid of that ad depicting animals parts in the slaughter house? I can't watch your videos with that thing there It's really gross I'm considering not visiting the site at all it's just that distracting.
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I'm sorry, that's not my video. They bought up ad space on my site. It won't be there forever. If you don't like the ad, you can follow the original link to my videos on blip and watch it there. Like I said though, the ad won't be there forever.
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Okay then.
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Why can't people admit that Romero is finished? His last good zombie movie was Day of the Dead, 25 years ago.
It sucks for him that he couldn't get his movies made when he was still in his prime, but in the last 10 years, Romero has been outclassed by many directors.
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Wow. That's a pretty Dick thing to say. I'd like to see you say that to his face.
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Sorry, but I totally agree with Leto. Hell, I'll say it to Romero's face, he's sucking it up and should know it. What is he gonna do, punch me in the face? Wouldn't be the first time I've been hit.
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I thought LAND OF THE DEAD was..is fantastic and DIARY OF THE DEAD a nice change of pace from the constant kill fest of the genre though there was still plenty happening. The fact that he is churning out movies this quickly says alot about his drive and level of motivation. As for the DAWN OF THE DEAD remake somebody else did that and i may have seen an interview during a convention on Youtube where he mentions that he wasnt too happy about how it turned out.
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I think I saw that same interview some time ago, HellBishop. LAND OF THE DEAD is a movie that, initially, I didn't care for that much, but it slowly grew on me over time. I liked DIARY OF THE DEAD as well and actually found some of the scenes haunting. I don't usually like those "POV" films (Cloverfield I hate with a passion) but DIARY I truely enjoyed.
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After seeing a trailer for Survival of the Dead online... I've lost all hope for Romero. I loved Night, Dawn and Day but I thought that Land was okay. Not good, not bad, just okay. In fact I was quite disappointed that it didn't live up to my expectations. I've heard nothing but terrible things about Diary, so I don't dare see it. Which is sad because I thought Diary looked interesting judging by the trailer.
Zombies are meant to be feared, not sympathized for. Zombies are DEAD! They can't develop feelings and emotions because zombies are DEAD! The only instinct they have is to feed just like wild animals.
... and don't even get me started on how horrible the gore effects look! I grew up in an area where there was no CGI, which made special effects appear all the more genuine. I didn't think that CGI would go way too far until seeing Survival's trailer.
Sorry, you get a zombie fangirl like myself all riled up, it's hard for me to stop!
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If you're looking for another film to review, "Splice" comes out this weekend, and it it looks like a movie that you might be interested in seeing. From what I've read, it's a horror/drama about a research scientist couple, played by Adrian Brody and Sarah Polley, who mix human DNA with the DNA of multiple animals resulting in living hybrid.
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Hey, I've got the same shirt.
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I find it interesting that you sided with the military in Day of the Dead. While it's certainly true that a cure is kinda too little, too late, 'ol Doc Frankenstein is also right when he tells Rhodes that fighting is not an option. They don't have the men, raw materials, or even ammo (or the capacity to make more) to keep fighting the undead. Running isn't much of an option, either, as the entire planet is overrun. The only possible solution is domestication. And, hey... a few zombies like Bub given spears or axes could make short work out of even fairly large hordes with no risk to living personnel. Zombies don't attack other zombies, after all, so at worst the feral ones might try to shamble away.
The situation is somewhat different in Survival from what I gather (I have not seen it yet). Unlike the scientists, the Muldoons have no reasonable chance of domesticating the undead. They're basically just hoping for a miracle which is unlikely to ever come.
Another poster mentioned that Romero seems obsessed with humanizing the zombies and I have to agree. Before, they were just bare echos of humanity, but for the most part an unstoppable force; they're not exactly evil, just fundamentally destructive, like a hurricane or tidal wave. Starting from Land, they seem to be getting more and more humanized in Romero's world which is a definite mistake. I rather liked Land myself, but my jaw dropped in shock at the "don't shoot the zombies, they're just looking for a place like us" bit at the end of it. Dude, seriously? These things just MURDERED THE ENTIRE SETTLEMENT. Granted, many of those people were rich douchebags, but that still isn't an excuse.
Romero-style (eg slow-moving and stupid) zombie movies work best, I think, when the primary antagonist is not the zombies, but the humans caught up in it. Let's face it, when stressed and lacking any authoritative structure, humans will almost invariably descend into barbarism and the desire to satiate base desires. This is how the zombies win -- they don't do anything directly, but cause human societies to self-destruct. If the humans could keep their heads about them, they'd easily be able to contain and eliminate a zombie threat (this basically does happen at the end of Shaun of the Dead).
One of my favorite bits in Dawn is a tiny bit of dialog that is frequently overlooked at the beginning. The government-representative dude being interviewed on the TV program says that the problem would've been contained if people three weeks ago had just followed orders and given recently-dead and reanimated family members over to the government for head-shottin' and burnin'. The whole reason for the zombie apocalypse was due to silly emotional attachment to a corpse.
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Interesting replies on how the zombies are being made more human in each picture. Its as if some sort of reverse evolution is going on which would have been great and more logical if it only involved the zombies getting stronger instead of more human. A dead body can get rock hard with rigor mortis so just imagine a stiff zombie arm crashing down on a persons head. Its like getting hit by a fossilized tree branch. Add some whacked out primal neuron electrical stimuli coming from a rotting brain down a decaying spinal column and you could get some odd extreme muscle behaviour making the zombies super strong til the next stage of death occurs where the muscles start to fall apart. At this time some desperate instinctive need to survive and propagate ones self might force some other evolution or new behaviour to arise. Maybe they'll decay and become a plague like infection killing off the rest of the human race like the bubonic plague.
Like Lindsey said zombies are meant to be feared not sympathized for. They represent death not life. You cant take the Devil's name and not expect demonic things to happen.
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i bet you get this a lot CS but i just have to say it: i love the tone of your voice.
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lol, I liked Diary of the Dead. I think that was one of my first reviews(so its not very good). Its been awhile since I've seen it though, and Im remembering more bad things about it than good(the "Shoot me" line/gag caused physical and emotional pain). I think I liked that movie more in segments than as a whole. As a whole, I guess I'd agree that its pretty bad. But I did like a handful of parts(the omish dude, a lot of the buildup and that garage scene was pretty intense). It easily is the worst of the Romero zombie movies though.
I think the problem Romero is having is he doesn't want to become redundant. "Night" was creepy, "Dawn" was epic, "Day" was claustrophobic, "Land" was post-apocalyptic and "Diary" was the POV thing. From what I hear, "Survival" tries to be a bit more than a comedy, and I think that's a mistake. Still haven't seen it though. I'll check it out when netflix gets it.
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http://blip.tv/file/3636535
Diary of the Dead wasn't that bad.. it just seemed like they were putting way too much effort to batter in some kind of message. Survival of the Dead for me felt that it had no point and that it went into goofy territory. Click on the link to hear my review, you will know what I mean.
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You know, Brad I watched this film and to be honest and I didn't find it that bad.
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Diary - Can't stand the narration. Can't stand the heavy-handed messages.
And hey, humans aren't the enemies! The zombies are! We're not going to sympathize with them.
Survival - A bit better.
It would have been interesting if the pro-zombie group weren't obvious villains.
Still can't stand for any side that sides with taming/keeing the zombies.
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I loved Diary of the Dead, and I have not seen any other Romaro movies.
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Brad your comments on Diary's flaws were exactly what I hated in that film. The narration & soundtrack completely destroyed the point of the 'POV' footage style. The narration especially irked me. Instead of letting the audience watch the film and interpret it on their own Romero uses the narration to literally explain the film to the audience. The narration was so heavy handed that I wondered if Romero was doing it intentionally to make it look like a bad student film.
I haven't seen Survival yet but based on your review I'll rent it rather than run it and buy it.
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This one has been out on DVD in the UK for a while now, and I said pretty much the same thing about it.
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Riiightt...diary of the dead is one of the best Romero film. It's kinda suprising that you like shit like cabin fever, paranormal activity and land of the dead but hate diary of the dead....quite sad.
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Actually brad has stated many times how much he hates Cabin Fever.
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I think all of george romero's zombie movies have gotten progressively worse since Dawn of the dead.
"day of dead" wasnt that good in my opinion. it was pretty boring for the most part. it also wasnt down to earth like Night or Dawn of the dead.
I thought "land of the dead" was garbage. it had a few good moments, but for the most part it was just a mixture of tedium and stupidity. "zombies with gubs." these three words are the refutation of any argument on this movie's account. the best part of that entire movie was when the midget, fight club owner jumped out and yelled "yaa!!" and scared that one chick. I nearly fell out of my seat at how over the top and absurd that whole scene was.
diary of the dead was even worse. they fucked up the POV concept so badly in that movie. Brad pretty much listed all the problems with it.
"survival of the dead," I think, was even worse than diary of the dead. this movie's concept is so lame, the characters so unlikable, the pacing so terrible, the plot so god-awful, that I almost turned the thing off. it is pure shit and a lot of it isnt even shit you cant even make fun of. alot of it is just boring. George Romero is dead to me.
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Yeah, I watched this on Netflix last month. It was pretty boring. Lesbian solider chick and non zombie twin were pretty cool, but other than that it wasn't memorable.
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Night of the living dead was the movie that got me into the zombie genre and it is still my favorite zombie movie. The remake is also really good but the original will always be my favorite. I am one of the few people who really didn't like Dawn of the dead I found it to be boring and while some scenes were fun the rest just bored me and the characters annoyed me to no end. I enjoyed Day of the dead but it had it's flaws and I liked Land of the dead but I didn't love it. Diary of the dead was just plain out boring and very forgettable. Survival of the dead was ok but the problem was that I went into it really hoping it was going to be good and was just very let down. I love Romero and while I don't love all of his zombie movies most of them even the ones I disliked are better than the majority of zombie movies I have seen. I love zombie movies and it's disappointing to see the genre going downhill with alot of the more recent zombie flicks at least the ones I have seen.
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"Disssapoint wrote:
Riiightt...diary of the dead is one of the best Romero film. It's kinda suprising that you like shit like cabin fever, paranormal activity and land of the dead but hate diary of the dead....quite sad."
Actually brad has stated many times how much he hates Cabin Fever.
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