So, you found
Night of the Living Dead boring, eh? Well, first, welcome to the club. Each FI before you felt the same way. In fact, during the first FI, many students slept, the two teachers freaked-out, and the whole ordeal came to a head with a "heart-felt talk." Ahhh...the memories. How's that for undead cannibals really bringing people together?
On one hand, your reaction is nothing new. On the other hand--how DARE you?
Have we taught you nothing? You claim to love zombies but hate this movie? Romero is the knight of the living dead. No him---no zombies! One doesn't exist without the other. Without this movie, there is no
Shaun of the Dead. No
28 Days Later. No nothing. Eat some gruel. Go to bed.
Do you claim to love rock 'n' roll but hate Elvis? Oh...you do? Well, my little whipper snappers, you shouldn't!
Here's how art works. You can choose to hate something influential. I hate Deep Purple. I hate the Yankees. I hated
There's Something About Mary. That's ok. I'm allowed. Art exists to demand preference. It exists to rouse debate on what is pleasing to us aesthetically.
But I am aware of each of those things. I have exposed myself to them. My judgement is based on awareness at least...analysis at best! Since I have been exposed to them, I can do certain important things. I can recognize their importance. I can posit an opinion.
See?
NOLD is the Elvis of zombie movies. It is certainly your right to NOT choose to rock out to Elvis records. Maybe Elvis doesn't rock as hard as you are accustomed to rocking. But you must RESPECT Elvis' influence. Period. Kiss the ring. I won't talk rock 'n' roll with someone who never heard an Elvis song, and I WILL NOT talk horror with someone who ignored
NOLD. As I will NOT ROLL ON SHABBAT!! Got it?
Romero elevated the game.
He exploited us. He showed us what other horror film-makers feared showing. He made two of the most important moves in horror film history.
HE MADE ZOMBIES COOL. By making them scary. By taking the dead-eyed creepiness and adding the most important element -- FLESH-EATING!
Before Romero, movie zombies were nothing. Lame aliens and slow-moving voodoo dudes.
They were like being chased by enslaved office workers. Seriously. if a zombie got you, it just wrestle you to the ground. Maybe hit you with a shoe. Honestly. They were no more dangerous than any big lumbering lummox. Easy to evade and avoid. And if by some crazy happenstance, you DID get caught...bump on the noggin. No worse.
Romero turned zombies into cannibals...and holy game changer! Now they were scary. Why? Cause aren't you, as a rule, scared of things that can eat you? Ghouls. Creeps. Flat out trouble. All flaking flesh and animal moans. "They're dead. They're all messed up." That was Romero.
Am I lying? Disprove me. Find me a cinematic zombie prior to
NOLD that remotely resembles what you know and love today.
Thought so.
HE MADE THE APOCALYPSE COOLER
Zombies are still not that much trouble one on one. But Romero invented the zombie infestation. And in doing so made a film that was anxiety-inducing as well as "jump" scary. The zombies, like life, win by overwhelming you. And this delicious metaphor has kept American society shuffling the zombie walk ever since.
Everyone in the modern zombie film is gonna die. Prior to Romero, the horror movie world was going to end in the rubber hands of Mothra or some giant bug. End of the world movies involved a lot of running and screaming. But not a lot of actual threat. Godzilla would run through a building, and people would just scatter around it magically. Certainly no on-screen dying. And certainly no on-screen dying because a character got eaten by a woman in your Nana's house dress.
In Romero's apocalypse, death is coming. Inevitable. Like the viewers, the characters WILL die. It's just a matter of when. The suspense comes in whether or not they will die at this very moment. Sound familiar? Zombies are the plague. And the plague is scary real.
Also, Romero's apocalypse bought with it the consideration and pontification of death. Characters faced their mortality. They discussed it. They allowed it to bring out the worst in them. Cue The Walking Dead. Viola! Instant genre.
On top of all that, NOLD had a message to offer. It stood as testament to the "unrest" of the wildest, most radically chaotic social times in our nation's history. Romero played with convention. He slammed the man. Indicted capitalism and government. He made a socially conscious horror movie. He made a youth movement horror movie. He pushed the envelope. And that is that. Watch the dang movie 'fore I hurt somebody.
