Despite
the widespread popularity and success of the sub-genre today, the zombie film
remained on the outskirts of Hollywood horror until the 1960s, perhaps due to
the fact that they were unsympathetic creatures that merely “shambled around at
the will of other people” (Halliwell 246, 248). These first cinematic zombies were
initially only reanimated with the control of an evil scientist, as was the
case with White Zombie (1932), which
is often sited as the first American zombie film.
Through the 1950s the
zombie was created by a mad scientist, such as The Creature with the Atom Brain (1956),[1]
which used a mad scientist combined with atomic radiation to return the dead to
life. In this film the mad scientist is also an ex-Nazi. Many thought Dead Snow (2009) was the first Nazi
zombie film, but even in classic horror films they were often symbolically
connected to this particular monster, using the zombies as soldiers in their
mindless army, as in Revenge of the
Zombies (1943).
The other variation of
zombies is those driven up from the ground with the help of the occult, whether
voodoo as in The Plague of the Zombies (1966), or some sort of
satanic ritual, as in The Evil Dead
(1981). These tend to be more demonic in nature, and usually have intentions
beyond the desire for flesh paired with aggressiveness more akin to The Exorcist than Night of the Living Dead. These films have been left off of this
list, instead remaining partial to the less intelligent and more flesh-desiring
living dead.
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The
zombie did not become individual monsters with a thirst for flesh until 1968
with George A. Romero’s Night of the
Living Dead. Romero removes the
human villain seen as the catalyst in previous zombie films, simultaneously
removing the explanation behind the dead rising again. The victims are a group
of strangers, forced to barricade themselves in an old farmhouse in hopes of
rescue or refrain. Among many significant alterations Romero made to the
creatures themselves is the infectious manner in which they duplicate, passing
whatever monstrous disease they have by their bite.
With
the national debate over the Vietnam War causing a similar separation of
community, Night of the Living Dead
also associates a political reading of the zombies, “filmed guerilla-style in
black-and-white, with the unflinching authority of a wartime newsreel” (Maddrey
51). Night of the Living Dead shows a community literally tearing
itself apart while in the confinement of the farmhouse, mostly due to the victim’s
inability to agree on anything. In previous horror films the monster was most
often destroyed with science, engineering and the good effort from men often
associated with government or law enforcement, but Night of the Living Dead ended with the cynical appearance of
government and authority after most have perished, destroying the only
survivor. Horror audiences were faced with the reality that we could no longer
rely on the authorities who demand our co-operation in exchange for their
protection. Before Night of the Living
Dead, “monsters were enemies who helped man gain confidence in their
ability to control and understand the world,” but as Psycho had altered the appearance of the monster, Night of the Living Dead radically
changed the significance (Crane 11).
Dawn of the Dead (1978) also encourages
a social reading of zombies, this time setting the location of attack in a
shopping mall, a clear remark on the consumerism of the time. The shopping mall
proves to be a much more stable shelter than the farmhouse, even containing a
gun shop to stock up on weapons for defense. The group of survivors build a
home in the mall, securely ensuring a safe area hidden from zombies and
looters, though they begin to realize that “their existence has no more purpose
than that of the zombies,” especially as all connections with the outside world
cease (Maddrey 71). After a biker gang enters the mall, proving as destructive
a force as the zombies themselves, two remaining survivors escape the safe
haven with the realization that “it is better to die as a family than living in
a society that recognizes the family only as the locus of the eternal
reproduction of the ideologies of the division of labour” (Humphries 116).
In
1985 Romero made his third zombie film as yet another “indictment of modern
American life,” this time as an allegory condemning “a generation of
hippies-turned-yuppies,” though audiences “in the carefree, consumer-friendly
1980s apparently did not feel the need for such a serious examination of personal
and societal values” and the film was a box-office failure (Maddrey 128-9). Day of the Dead was enough of a failure
to ensure zombies disappeared from mainstream horror for nearly two decades.
The return of zombies in mainstream
horror began with British
horror film 28 Days Later, which made
$45 million in America out of the $82 million it made worldwide, followed by Zack Snyder’s remake of Romero’s Dawn of the Dead (2004). Among other changes, the zombies now ran after
their prey with a heightened characteristic of rage. Zombies have since seen a
decade of success rivaling Romero’s initial international impact.
In the last ten years
there have been more zombie films than I can possibly mention. This past year
alone saw the first blockbuster zombie film, World War Z, not to mention the zombie romance, Warm Bodies. Romero has added three new
additions to his franchise and AMC’s “The Walking Dead” has become one of
televisions most successful shows. But what marked this return? To answer that
question, we must look at what made the monster popular in decades past.
Whether it was a fear of
the gentrification brought on by Nazis or a distrust of government during the
Vietnam War, zombies have always been utilized in cinema during times of
political and social unrest. It is no surprise that zombies returned onscreen
following the terrorist attacks of 9/11 and the subsequent war in Iraq
5. Cemetery Man (1994)
This Italian film based on the novel
by Tiziano Sclavi and starring British actor Rupert Everett followed the
success of a few other cult-favorite horror films with extreme gore and a sense
of humor. Sam Raimi made his way into the world of Hollywood
4. Dead Alive (1992)
The 1990s had a
bit of a dry spell in American horror films, probably because things were
relatively good and nobody was willing to pay good money to see disturbing
films. The movies in the genre were safe and sanitary pastiches of the 1980s
slasher films. The nudity was removed and violence downplayed, with young
attractive WB stars inserted into the leading roles. There were no risks, but
simply a calculated cashing in of a simple trend started by Kevin Williamson
and Wes Craven with the Scream
franchise. For the really good horror films of the 1990s, you have to look at
foreign films like Cemetery Man and Dead Alive, also known as Braindead.
Long before
Peter Jackson was praised by fanboys for making the perfect Lord of the Rings adaptations, he made
his name in New Zealand
Timothy Balme
stars as Lionel Cosgrove, an unfortunate young man with an overbearing mother.
When he meets and falls in love with a local girl named Paquita (Diana
Peñalver), Lionel begins his separation from his mother, which is met by
animosity and sabotage. When his mother attempts to ruin a date, she is
accidentally bitten by a monkey taken from Skull
Island (nod to King Kong, which Jackson
3. Shawn of the Dead (2004)
If it isn’t
clear already from the first two choices, comedy seems to lend itself to the
zombie genre. This is not only the best example of a comedic zombie film, it
belongs to a rare group of movies which are able to successful blend comedy
with horror without losing either of the extreme reactions expected from both
genres. Because of the preconceived notions that audiences had from previously
viewed zombie films, Simon Pegg and Edgar Wright are able to turn expectations
on their nose for humor’s sake.
This isn’t the first time that this
group collaborated to recreate/spoof their favorite genres. The television series
“Spaced” starred Pegg and was directed by Wright. This writing team is only
becoming more ambitious by turning these episodes into feature-length ideas.
They aren’t spoofs as much as they are loving revisions. Quentin Tarantino
exclusively lives off of making these types of films.
Our title
character Shaun (Pegg) leads a life of routine, happy to lounge carelessly with
his childhood friend, Ed (Nick Frost). He is satisfied with his mediocre job
and dreary routine, stuck in a haze until he loses his girlfriend, Liz (Kate
Ashfield). Even with the loss of a girlfriend, Shaun continues in his pattern
until he wakes to find that the country has gone into ruins with the spread of
zombies. The television tells him to stay inside, but Shaun and Ed decide to fight
their way to pick up everyone important to Shaun. In their rescue efforts they
end up in the same routine as each other night, only with the inclusion of
zombies and mayhem.
The opening
credits do a wonderful job of showing most of the employed public as living
zombies, and when the dead start to walk again they go about the same routines
as they did in life. This is a simple yet profound statement about living, and
we are led to believe that Shaun has woken up from his slumber by the end of
the film. It is also yet another zombie film on this list with love at the
center of the narrative, not to mention the memorable bromance between Pegg and
Frost.
2. 28 Days Later (2002)
Although Zack Snyder revived the
American zombie film with his remake of George A. Romero’s Dawn of the Dead, many of the new stylistic choices made to the undead
creatures were first featured in British filmmaker Danny Boyle’s 28 Days Later. By removing the label of
zombies and instead using a contagious disease as the explanation for people’s
erratic behavior, Boyle reinvented the genre with creatures that could run at
full speed. Technically, I suppose this means that 28 Days Later is not a zombie film, but it belongs in this category
if only for the influence it had in the zombie revival.
The blood-borne biohazard within the
film causes extreme rage in the infected, giving them a single-minded mentality
towards aggression. The outcome of mass attacks upon the uninfected is the same
as it is in any other zombie film, and a group of survivors must band together
in order to survive. The film follows a coma patient named Jim (Cillian Murphy)
who wakes up 28 days after the virus has overrun London
While the first
three films in this list are humorous, 28
Days Later is deadly serious. Although it was in production in September of
2001, this film aligns with a shift that horror films took towards realism and
bleak narratives in post 9/11 cinema. At the same time, this film still ends
with a bit of hope for a ‘happily ever after,’ and a romance subplot that comes
to a climactic sequence of near Shakespearean resolution.
1. Night of the Living Dead/ Dawn of the Dead (1968/1978)
The only American zombie films in the
entire list are also the top choices. Influence on the genre alone solidifies Night
of the Living Dead in nearly any zombie film list, and I can’t help but cheat
at my own list by including the first of many follow-up films. George A. Romero
didn’t invent the zombie film, but laid more groundwork in the genre than any
other filmmaker had or has since. Although White
Zombie with Boris Karloff was the first zombie film, it might as well have
been Night of the Living Dead with
the amount that he was able to forever change in the sub-genre. I used to watch
Night of the Living Dead on
television every Halloween at midnight and could never anticipate the film
enough for the eerie scenes to lose any of their impact. Few films have the
power to stand as many repeat viewings as I have given Night of the Living Dead.
The classic story begins when the
dead mysteriously begin to rise. A woman visiting a grave at the cemetery is
forced to run from the newly risen dead who have a hunger for live flesh,
seeking refuge in a farmhouse. Slowly others gather until five strangers are
holed up in the house. They have boarded the house up and locked themselves
inside as prisoners, unable to leave with hoards of living dead wandering
around waiting for a meal. It only takes one bite for a human to turn into one
of the undead monsters, and this only makes matters more complicated when close
relations within the surviving group are bitten.
Shot in
black-and-white and made to look similar to the newsreels being shown of the
Vietnam War, Night of the Living Dead
is rooted in the politics of the time while somehow managing to still become
timeless. The simplicity of the storyline has been revisited countless times,
and Italian filmmaker Lucio Fulci would make an infamous unofficial sequel to Dawn of the Dead in 1979. This was only
possible after Romero released his equally praised and socially relevant sequel
in 1978, dealing with American consumerism rather than the Vietnam War when the
survivors are trapped in a shopping mall.
Crane, Jonathan
Lake Thousand
Oaks
Halliwell, Leslie. The Dead That Walk: Dracula, Frankenstein,
the Mummy and Other
Favorite Movie Monsters. New York
Humphries, Reynold. The American Horror Film: An Introduction. Edinburgh
Maddrey, Joseph. Nightmares in Red, White and Blue: The
Evolution of the American
Horror Film. Jefferson :
McFarland & Company, Inc., Publishers, 2004. Print.
Worland, Rick. The Horror Film: An Introduction. Malden
Print.
[1] Also see
Teenage Zombies (1959) and Womaneater (1958) for examples of mad
scientists in zombie films.
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