They're Coming For Us All
They are living and yet they're dead. Reanimated but soulless, they traverse the land with evil intent.
In an age when horror films are so prevalent, it’s hard for many to appreciate the impact made by George A. Romero’s stark cinematic masterpiece, Night of the Living Dead (1968). “After nearly four decades of reviewing films for the Los Angeles Times,” wrote critic Kevin Thomas in an essay on the flick, “I still regard George Romero’s original Night of the Living Dead as the scariest movie I have ever seen.”
Romero didn’t invent zombies so much as he reinvented them for modern times. In his film, radiation from a space probe returning from Venus explodes in the Earth’s atmosphere, reanimating corpses, which claw from their graves to go on a bloody rampage across the Eastern Seaboard. They attack the living for food. Those attacked by the zombies become zombies themselves, establishing a geometric progression that threatens to wipe out the human race.
In the past, films about the walking dead followed the original premise of zombies as taught in teachings on voodoo: Sorcerers use magic to raise the dead, who then serve the sorcerers as workers or slaves.
One of the first films to feature zombies followed that premise. The movie was the 1932 release White Zombie, which was produced independently and starred Bela Lugosi. (It also inspired the name of a popular rock band.)
Many consider White Zombie to feature Lugosi's finest performance.
Another film that followed the zombie-as-slave theme was 1943's Revenge of the Zombies.
However, after Night of the Living Dead, most filmmakers embraced Romero’s vision of zombies as autonomous, murderous cannibals. Well, technically, they’re not cannibals because they don't eat each other. They just chow down on the living.
Upon its release, Night of the Living Dead was panned by many critics for its depictions of graphic violence and gore. Singled out for criticism were scenes of the undead devouring intestines and other human body parts. Though still gruesome, those scenes—by today’s standards—now appear tamer.
Produced for about $150,000 by a group of
Some newspapers even wrote editorials condeming the movie, but, predictably, for many, that just added to the film's allure.
It may be significant that the black-and-white film takes place in autumn, a season of metamorphosis and death in nature. It also begins on a Sunday, the Christian Sabbath, which some suggest symbolizes religion’s failure to truly deliver us from evil.
In any case, the film opens with a brother and sister, Johnny (played by co-producer Russell Streiner) and Barbara (Judith O’Dea), going to a cemetery to visit their father’s grave. While the sister is somewhat creeped out by the setting, the brother teases her good-naturedly, using a Boris Karloff voice to say, “They’re coming for you, Barbara.” Which proves to be true moments later when the pair is attacked by one of the walking dead. Barbara survives, but Johnny goes down suffering horribly. (The graveyard, by the way, is an actual cemetery in Evans City, Pa., and fans often make pilgrimmages to site. A popular landmark is the headstone of Nicholas Kramer, which is clearly visible in the film.)
As the plot unfolds, the viewer meets a handful of survivors, some of whom bravely battle the tide of zombies unleashed on the globe. Others are not so brave and pay for their cowardice with grisly deaths. However, some of the brave ones also die, saving Night of the Dead from being little more than a low-brow morality play. It skewers the notion that, against incredible odds, a strong-willed individual can somehow thrive in a social vacuum. The movie also makes pointed observations on civil rights, the Vietanam war, and the shortcomings of the media and government.
"We didn't know that it would ever get recognized," Romero told the magazine Film Journal. "I mean, we took it seriously. We really were trying to make it as much a metaphor as it was a thrill ride."
Romero went on to make several more zombie films in his career in horror movies, including Dawn of the Dead, a remake of Night of the Living Dead, Land of the Dead and Diary of the Dead. He's now working on Island of the Dead.
In some way, Romero felt a kinship with the walking dead. "I like the monsters being us," he once said. "Zombies are the blue-collar monsters."
To view the original Night of the Living Dead, click here.
