Dawn Of The Dead (2004)
George A. Romero first wrote and directed the original Dawn Of The Dead in 1978 that became an iconic film and is responsible for the modern day craze that are zombies. Over 25 years later he teamed up with James Gunn and Zack Snyder to remake his master-piece, bringing Dawn Of The Dead back to life.
The film is written both by George A. Romero himself and James Gunn, it is directed by Zack Snyder a newcomer only previously directing two films. The cast doesn't consist of any big name "Hollywood A-Listers" but a practically unknown Sarah Polley, Ving Rhames and Jake Weber. Despite the newcomers and the "amateur" feel to the film, it manages to adapt George A. Romero's original screenplay into a modern and more polished film that shows how far Hollywood has come and progressed over the years. Not only is it better in a technical point of view but the acting is far much better and is an improvement on the 1978 original. When comparing it to the original they use the same narrative of a virus or disease spreading quickly across the world bringing back the dead with it and allowing them to take the living with them, the only way to kill them is to severe their brains and once bitten you will slowly endure the torture of turning into one of them. However as Hollywood has progressed so has the zombies themselves, becoming much more quicker and smarter unlike Romero's original slow walking pale ghouls.
The Film begins with Ana (Sarah Polley) clocking off a long shift as a nurse, coincidentally her last patient being a guy who has a "bite" wound. Going home she gets in bed with her boyfriend and falls asleep but awakes to a living nightmare. A little girl who lives in the neighbourhood is infected with this disease and leaps onto Ana's boyfriend ripping apart his neck, blood gushing everywhere and the little neighbourhood terror banging at the door sets us up for a fast paced opening sequence. Ana escaping through the bathroom window jumps into her car driving through her now apocalyptic neighbourhood looking for answers but unfortunately finding them at a bottom of a ditch as she looses control of her car and crashes. As she wakes we get introduced to Kenneth (Ving Rhames) a cop with a zero tolerance attitude, as the pair look for a way out of hell they meet more survivors and the group heads towards the shopping mall, just like Romero's original.
Unlike most modern horror films we have a large group of survivors but are only encouraged to be attached to a few, the others more than likely just there for Zombie bait. We as an audience care for Kenneth the cop, a TV salesman that just happens to come up with the right ideas (James Weber) and a "ghetto" loudmouth Andre (Mekhi Phifer) who's wife is pregnant. The way the characters are picked off is truly horrific and emotional, this film touches areas that other films rarely do and that leads for a terrifying, gruesome experience. One relationship In the film is between a stranded gun-shop owner and Kenneth who communicate through various signs and binoculars. The relationship touches at Romero's 1978 humorous approach as they play a "shoot the look-alike" game with the horde merging outside. To top it off there's even a cute fluffy dog that plays some role in the narrative.
In the rest of the film the survivors have to do some small "jobs" like fix the generator that lead to the dark, tense action scenes where zombies jump out of no where. The group as it slowly decreases decides to start taking risks and in a very excitable action-packed way they escape from the mall and head towards the dock. A few more propane explosions, blood splatters and heroic sacrifices later the film finishes leaving you truly entertained.
Dawn Of The Dead really does give you what you expect and a little more when you sit down to watch it but is it better than Romero's 1978 original? That's down to personal taste and opinion but for sure you wont be disappointed with this "bloody" great post-apocalyptic horror.
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