#6 DAWN OF THE DEAD - Horror Countdown to Halloween

The king of zombies is George A. Romero. His groundbreaking 1968 Night of the Living Dead shaped the whole zombie genre. He perfected the zombie film ten years later in his sequel to that film Dawn of the Dead. The modern day remake would speed up the zombies but Romero's have always been and hopefully always will be your standard slow-walking zombies.

Dawn of the Dead takes place in the same world as its predecessor. Zombies have overrun the nation. SWAT teams and police regularly raid buildings to kill and clean up zombies. The film opens in Philidelphia and follows two SWAT members who team up with a traffic reporter and his girlfriend when shit hits the fan. They take refuge in a shopping mall where Romero throw zombies, biker gangs, and themselves at each of the survivors.

This small band of characters is largely what makes this film so great. We are given time to understand each of the characters and how they react to the situations that come their way. Depending on your own personality, you will identify with some characters more than others. Their social interactions under such a stressful situation gives the movie depth. Romero also slaps on a healthy helping of social commentary about consumerism and man's selfish nature.

Tom Savini famously did the effects for this film and it shows. There are several amazing makeups in this plus loads of gore. Unfortunately when they ordered the fake blood, it came back more pink than deep red. As a result the film's blood tends to look fake as all hell. Get over it quickly and focus on the fantastic story being told.

Currently there are four versions of the film. The original theatrical cut is the best however the European cut is also very good and includes a wicked soundtrack by Goblin. The extended cuts both have too much filler than kills the momentum and power of the film. Stay away from those if you have never seen the film before.

Overall, Dawn of the Dead is just about as perfect of a zombie film as you can get. Sure the zombies are slow but there are hundreds of them and being cornered by a mob is scary shit. The film set the bar for zombie films and only a few films come close to giving this a run for it's money.

written by Matthew Robinson