Night of the Living Dead (1968)

I’ve referenced this film many a night before, and now, after experiencing it once again, this time on the big screen, I bring you Night of the Living Dead, the mother of all modern zombie films. In fact, the inventor of all modern zombie films. Co-written and directed by George A. Romero, Night of the Living Dead placed into our society what we know is a zombie. A diseased or reanimated corpse with minimal brain activity feeding on human flesh and spreading the disease. Sometimes they’re slow, sometimes they’re fast. But they all come from this core model. This wonderful core model. This is wonderful not just as a good model for zombies in the future, but as a terrifying and demented horror film. I saw this movie in reparatory with my 9-year-old brother. He is just growing up into horror films, and loves them so, and soon will as much as I do, I hope. This movie both amazed and terrified him. It was a fascinating sight. He couldn’t keep his eyes away from the screen, black & white, grainy, and beautiful. It is one of those sights that makes me forget that Adam Sandler keeps making money, one of those images that puts life back into my film-loving heart. The plot of the film concerns a group of people (Duane Jones, Judith O’Dea, Karl Hardman, Marilyn Eastman, Keith Wayne, Judith Ridley, and Kyra Schon), unknown to each other, staying inside of a farm house while they attempt to survive an attack from the reanimated dead, started by an unknown cause. But the movie isn’t about the zombies. The movie is about how we would react in a situation of pure pain and destruction-what we would do if we were faced with the end. Many films cover this, I write stories covering this, but this film does it best. The human dynamics of the film are spectacular, and you truly get to see these people fight and crumble to the point of death. This is a masterpiece, George A. Romero’s masterpiece of film. This is a timeless classic, one that should never be missed. “They’re coming to get you, Barbara!”
9.5/10