Having just watched the so-called remake of the Romero classic, Day of the Dead (US-2008; dir. Steve Miner), I was intending to review it — fairly and without prejudice, even though Romero’s original remains what is for me the best of his Living Dead films, fan opinion notwithstanding. However, I happened to read this review of Miner’s effort and more-or-less agreed with everything said — which can pretty well be summed up with this sentence: “Where Romero created a film about isolation and explosive cabin fever that became a philosophical look at the end of humanity, Day of the Dead 2008 quickly becomes just another zombie film by the numbers.”
Suddenly I couldn’t be bothered penning my own condemnation.
So instead check out this fantastic clip of one of Romero’s 1985 zombies de-zombifying himself:
Now that’s a better zombie movie than the 2008 whatever-it-is.
- Note that I don’t even mention the hyped-up dead, who not only run at super-speed — except when it’s convenient for the protagonists that they don’t — but manage to defy gravity by crawling along the ceiling and generally acting like ninjas.
- Oops! I just mentioned it, didn’t I! Sorry!
- Source: via Boing Boing and Cat Sparks
why is it call’d day of the dead when it takes place at night
I think it’s “Day of” as in “Day of the Triffids” and “Every dog has his day”… meaning “the time of their ascendancy”. But even then the phrase doesn’t apply to this “remake”. The fact that the dead had pretty well taken over the world was another part of the original that the remake left out.