Talk about a dry spell. It’s been what? Two three years since we’ve seen the underrated - unappreciated “Diary Of The Dead” - you know why people dislike it? I’ll tell you. They dislike it because it is ahead of our time and what people don’t get - they deem as crap. And so the genre seems to have died again in such a short time span, but I still think there is life to be sucked out of it, but if done by the right person.
The problem I now see and understand is the approach, every filmmaker out there in the exception of a few have approached the genre as if it were a joke, they don’t have the ability to make it real so they make fun of it and people are tired of seeing the same thing over and over. And it’s been beaten out so many damn times that finally, the genre has settled for the DVD market. If you look at every other Romero picture in the exception of Diary and Land - the films are like stage plays. There’s all this action and chaos in the first act, and in the second act we settle for drama that is screwed harder and harder until it finally explodes with action in the final act. And yes there is also the gorehound pictures, but what many people don’t realize is that Lucio Fulci wasn’t alll about the gore, he dealt with themes which he tried to transcribe through the camera, most of his films deal with the occult, that is why you get these weird endings that you just don’t get. But I appreciate the Romero films best, where there is strak realism and character delivery, and this coming from a Resident Evil Fan. Well I’ll tell you why I liked THE FIRST Resident Evil - beside the fact that Milla stars in it. I see that as a modern exploitation movie with a huge budget, the opening has that Escape From New York exposition and sure the dialogue and characters are utter crap, but the sci-fi approach made the film an interesting faliure. It’s eye candy with no soul, but it’s still damn good in some parts.
Nowadays all the soul is gone, it’s just cheap banality with uninspired filmmakers (DVD filmmakers) who crank up the soundtrack with heavy metal and have people being torn up by zombies scene after scene. They have no right to even delve in this genre that is much more, if critics only knew how hard it is to make a zombi film work, they would shut their mouths pretty quickly.
There’s still some life that can be sucked out of this genre, but I don’t think it can ever hold up, seeing that most of the audience consists of videogame players who don’t have good cinematic sense of what makes a good movie - but there’s still an audience no less. It’s just a matter of the filmmaker who approaches the material. In all there hasn’t really been a zombie film that has surpassed the original “Dawn Of The Dead” - and how can there be? I just guess all the great filmmakers are too good to make one or something. I’m drunk on yougurt, what do I know. I just want another zombie movie that is actually released in theatres. :’(
If people didn’t “get” Diary of the Dead than they’re fucking morons and that’s why most people hated the movie. The message was obvious (the characters literally spell it out for you more than once) and that’s kind of always been Romero’s flaw. He thinks he’s way smarter than his audience so he drops all subtly and talks down to them. That and whoever does his casting needs to find a new job.
There’s a bunch of Zombie stuff being worked on right now, though I get what you mean about not nearly enough of them taking a serious stab at the genre. Here’s a list of some of the ones in production right now.
“The Corporate Zombie Killers”- “The story tells of office temps battling a zombie outbreak in a corporate office park.”
“Zombieland” - it’s another comedy but it’s got Bill Murray playing a Zombie so it’s gotta be fuckin’ gold. Plus it stars Woody Harrelson, Mila Kunis, Emma Stone, and Amber Heard.
And for a film that will take things a little more serious we’ve got “World War Z” which is supposed to be a pretty epic movie. From what I’ve heard it’ll be somewhat like Children of Men but with Zombies. If it’s have as good as the script it should be a pretty damn fine film.
Don’t we already have a Zombie movie thread?
[quote=“Dex”]
If people didn’t “get” Diary of the Dead than they’re fucking morons and that’s why most people hated the movie.[/quote]Have to agree with that, this coming from a massive Dawn, Martin and even Two Evil Eyes fan. Like many of the old masters, Romero doesn’t seem to have a whole lot to say these days so he just keeps repeating himself. You can only stretch things out so far in one direction before the rubber band eventually breaks. Although I respect him (and Argento), I’m not terribly intrigued by his future projects. The zombie film at this point has been so beaten into the ground that most horror fans are simply tired of them. The better ones released these days are broken down like this: 100% comedy-horror, and 89% foreign. Sure, I guess it would be nice to have some big film come along and reintroduce the genre - but at this point I’d enjoy a break from them. Well, I say that while at the same time I have the Zombie Bloodbath trilogy (which should, by all accounts, be the worst zombie series ever unleashed) waiting for me to take them on at the house.
I think it’s weird that Paul WS Anderson started a new trend for this genre which is more of a sci-fi/action, and they’ve all done pretty well. It’s really a new format for it - in a way. In all, it is an exhausted genre…even I turned from horror to classic films because i got bored. There’s nothing better than a classic film I say.
Yeah, I think if you over saturate your movie watching with any one Genre you’re gonna get bored pretty quick.
[quote=“Dex”]
Yeah, I think if you over saturate your movie watching with any one Genre you’re gonna get bored pretty quick.
[/quote]Yeah, I’m a dedicated horror and cult film enthusiast so I try to keep somewhat up to date with all of the latest trends and such, however the zombie thing has just gotten so old at this point. Doesn’t mean there haven’t been some interesting projects to come out as of recent. Dead Snow has been getting a lot of positive marks by most, although I wouldn’t count it as a favorite I definitely liked it. Tokyo Zombie was another interesting film which I liked quite a bit and would definitely recommend.
The horror genre moves in waves though, it’ll go back to the point where everyone sits around wishing they were popular again as soon as mystery-slashers or giant-mosquitoes take over everyone’s imagination ;D