Dawn of the Dead (1978) - Lisa's Review

This is a movie I have watched a few times.  It does remain one of the better 'of the dead' movies.  Hey, the remake wasn't even that bad.  In all honesty I've never been a big fan of zombie movies, but I happen to be married to someone obsessed by them, so I've had to watch my fair share of them.

When I recommend this movie, it isn't a recommended for a general movie fan, but rather one for a fan of older horrors or more notably fans of zombie horror.

Our story follows 2 SWAT teams (yes, 2!) and a couple who work for a television company and their fight against the ever-growing epidemic of the rise of the undead.  The main location for the movie is a shopping mall which has escaped most of the zombies.  Our four leading characters are TV Exec Francine (Gaylen Ross), her boyfriend - traffic reporter Stephen (David Emge), SWAT member Roger (Scott H Reiniger) and his friend Peter (Ken Foree).  The four manage to rid the mall of the existing zombies, build a false wall which constructs a corridor that conceals the entrance they had been using and they took out trucks to block all the other entrances.  While showboating on one of the truck rides, Roger ends up getting bitten, but the remaining three try to care for him at first.  For a while they live it up, availing of everything you can do inside an empty mall.  This freedom leads to feeling not so free after all when they realise they are trapped inside due to the zombies outside.  They begin to think about taking their chances on the outside, but since there wasn't a complete consensus within the group they stayed, at least until Roger eventually snuffs it and starts to reanimate.  Peter does the needful and pulls the trigger.

While we mention Peter, it has to be mentioned that again Romero was one of the few directors of the time having a black lead in a movie.  Peter is easily the best character in the movie for me, hands down.  It's staggering now to think that such a casting was a rarity.  What I also loved is the fact that Francine isn't a completely useless, screaming, tripping-over-herself damsel in distress.  Ok, she has a few moments, but overall I was pleased to see a strong woman lead.  From what I read, unfortunately this was more to do with Gaylen Ross than Romero, but to his credit, he listened!

So, I digressed... Finally the remaining three don't get a say in whether or not they get to stay in the mall anymore.  A gang of want-it-all bikers have seen Francine having helicopter flying lessons at night (just in case they did decide to flee) decide to break into the mall to see what more they can acquire in the way of expensive, yet worthless objects.  On breaking in, they allow all the undead to infiltrate the mall.  It's here that the beginning ends.  I don't want to give away the ending or the fate of Stephen, Francine or Peter.  So, give it a go!

As far as zombie movies go, this is a good one.  Ok, so by todays standards, the blue-grey made-up skin of the zombies and bright red blood are very dated, but we have to remember it was 1978.  Some of the effects we see in this movie are ground breaking.  A special mention has to go to the shotgun to the head scene right at the start of the movie.  What this effect was originally to be used for would have had our movie ending very differently.  The way the movie was supposed to end was changed in production, but not before some practice runs had taken place.  For my moneys worth, I think the original ending that they DIDN'T go with would have been far superior.  I still do like this movie, but I think I would have loved it had they kept the original vision.