George Romero's zombie movies have always been standouts in the genre. Easily the best zombie movies ever, and contenders for the best horror movies ever. Night of the Living Dead (his first movie) set the ground work for every single zombie movie to come after it, and Dawn of the Dead, which came 10 years later in 1978 set the new standard for splatter and gore flicks. If you ask me, without George Romero's zombie trilogy, horror movies would have never been the same.
Day of the Dead takes place after the entire Earth has become over-run with zombies. Every human must either hide, fight, or die. The movie follows two groups of people: doctors and army men. The army men pose as the bad guys in this movie (just as Mr. Cooper did in Night of the Living Dead) and the doctors pose as the good guys (as Ben did in Night). The groups of people are hiding out in a secluded underground base. The zombies await outside, while the humans try to come up with a plan to eliminate the zombie plague.
Day of the Dead falls at the end of the trilogy. Being made in 1985, zombie movies were already high on the charts. Since the popularity of Dawn of the Dead, especially in Europe, a ton of independent film makers were pushing out these zero-budget zombie flicks faster than you could watch them. Finally, in 1985, George Romero and Tom Savini grouped back together to show the kids how it was done. Day of the Dead fixed all the mistakes that occurred in Dawn of the Dead, and turned out to be the perfect zombie movie. Day of the Dead IS the best zombie movie ever made.
The main mistake that was fixed was the way the zombies looked. In 1978, Tom Savini (special makeup effects) was fairly new to the job, and couldn't take on the very large amount of zombies he had to apply make-up to. Therefore, he simply painted their faces blue. Here, Tom Savini had his own team of make up artist. The zombies in Day of the Dead look far more disgusting and gross. Facial decays and bite marks were abundant in this movie. Not only that, but every zombie looked different. No two zombies looked exactly the same, which added a small shock element every time a zombie appeared on screen. The gore in Day of the Dead was even more amped up than Dawn of the Dead. It looked more real, and came in much higher amounts. Day of the Dead ranks up with some of the goriest movies of all time; only Cannibal Ferox and Dead-Alive surpass Day of the Dead. For the way the gore looked, Day of the Dead holds the trophy for the best special effects I've ever seen in a movie - bar none.
While the special effects have greatly improved, they aren't even the main reason I favor Day of the Dead over every other zombie movie. The reason Day of the Dead is, and always will be labeled as my favorite, is for the extremely serious tone of the movie. The characters in this movie (with the small exception of the doctor) are extremely serious and brutal in tone and pose an even bigger threat to the good guys than the zombies! It's Night of the Living Dead turned up to 11! The characters in this movie (especially Captain Rhodes) are very, very well written characters, although I wouldn't hold then as high as the characters in Dawn of the Dead.
Day of the Dead is an extremely serious zombie flick with absolutely no humor whatsoever. It's serious, it's brutal, and has an extremely thick script with plenty to offer. Remember to bring a barf bag!
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