In a way this is the sort of review that doesn’t need to be written. It’s a George Romero film. It’s Day Of The Dead as a matter of fact, the third in the director’s series of zombie films. While there are six films, the last two are sort of a reboot, so you can see Day Of The Dead as part of a quad-ilogy. Let’s face it: This is the guy responsible for the modern day zombie mythology. You know if you are interested in this or not.
And chances are, if you’ve read this far, you’re interested in this Blu-ray.
As well you should be. The “Living Dead” franchise is synonymous with zombies for good reason. Night Of The Living Dead took the mythology of the walking dead and gave it some definition. There are plenty of other films Romero has been involved in, but the zombie franchise is what will be his legacy.
Shout Factory brings us this chapter, a bleak look at what has happened since Dawn Of The Dead. It appears the planet has been overrun with zombies and those who still live are behind small barricaded areas. A small crew attempts to find a way to stop the reanimation process, but of course they wind up encountering a number of obstacles.
Romero uses the zombie genre to make a commentary on humanity and society, and when you remember this Day Of The Dead is a much more interesting film. Oh sure, there’s plenty of visceral thrills with buckets of flesh being devoured, and while I’m not a fan of the graphic nature of these things, it is window dressing to what Romero is saying to us about us. Heck, there’s a mad scientist referred to as Frankenstein, which shows how self-aware Romero is. He’s poking fun at himself and the genre.
Can a tiger change its stripes? That’s one of the questions explored here, and of course there’s some veiled political criticism as well. While in some ways it is the least necessary of the four main “Dead” films it is the necessary bridge between the first two and Land Of The Dead which is the one which holds the most overt social commentary.
Sadly Day Of The Dead would be overshadowed by Return Of The Living Dead which came out around the same time. The latter was a direct sequel to Night Of The Living Dead by that film’s co-screenwriter John Russo and Dan O’Bannon. That film would spawn a number of sequels as well, providing an alternate version of the zombie apocalypse. Both films feature some humor, with Return Of featuring more of it. Some of the humor in Day Of feels perhaps forced or out of place, much of that coming from the “kept” zombie – if you haven’t seen the film, I don’t want to spoil it for you, but if you have, then you know what I am referring to.
Still, Day Of The Dead is a solid zombie film, and anybody into the genre needs this in their collection. Shout Factory’s Scream Factory imprint offers up what seems to be a pretty definitive version. Things kick off with two audio commentary tracks, both worth listening to. One features Romero fan and filmmaker Roger Avery, with the other featuring Romero, makeup effects artist Tom Savini, production designer Cletus Anderson and actress Lori Cardille. If you only have time for one, check out that second one. Then we get an hour and a half documentary on the film, and by default the whole …Of The Dead franchise. Even if you like the other films but not this one, the documentary alone is worth purchasing the Blu-ray for. Then there’s a half hour of behind the scenes footage from Tom Savini’s personal footage, and still more.
Really, a fantastic package that zombie fans will … not gonna do it… sink their… NO, I’M NOT GONNA DO IT!