Dawn of the Dead

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Summary: A must-have horror classic with outstanding commentary!
Review: George Romero's 1979 "Dawn of the Dead" was like nothing I had ever seen when it came out 25 years ago. If you've grown up on computer-generated special effects this film and its low-budget splatter may disappoint you, but if you approach this movie with an open mind and a warped sense of humor you'll have a good time. It is not really scary, but it is GORY... and funny, and ironic.

The audio and video quality on this DVD is far superior to the previous VHS releases, and the DVD includes theater trailers, TV spots, radio spots, and a poster gallery. The *best* extra feature, however, is the commentary featuring director George Romero, his wife, who was involved in making the film, and makeup man Tom Savini.

Let's face it- most DVD "commentary" is completely worthless, but it is really a treat to hear Romero, his wife, and Savini discuss the origins of the film, the challenges of making it, and its impact. An informed and enthusiastic moderator joins them, and the commentary is full of good anecdotes, details, and perspective.

If you've seen the new version of "Dawn of the Dead," take the time to see the original and appreciate it for how different it was from anything else we had seen back then. And if you haven't seen the new film, you *really* owe it to yourself to see the first film. Don't weigh one against the other, just appreciate how each film was right for its time.

Rating:
Summary: When There's No More Room In Hell...
Review: "Dawn of the Dead" is a great film no matter how you look it. Good characters, and Goblin's music is awesome. For those of you yet to see the remake, keep a sharp eye open for a pleasant little surprise of Ken Foree and Scott Reiniger.

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Summary: still one of the greatest
Review: This 1978 classic horror epic hasn't aged one bit as four desperate survivors of a zombie-filled nation barricade themselves in a Pennsylvania shopping mall. George Romero is at his best in this sequel to "Night of the Living Dead", as he manipulates his viewers emotions from one scene to the next. This new Divimax edition is a wonder to behold with superb DTS sound and amazing picture quality(it looks and sounds much better than when I saw it at the theater when it first hit the big screen). It's now presented in Romeros' preferred running time of 127 minutes. I have the now out of print 137 minute Original Director's Edition which has footage that adds nothing to the story(even though it's great as well), but I much prefer this new edition. Still one of the greatest horror films ever made, this one should not be missed. One final note: for those of you who think this film has another ending, it does'nt. It was originally written with another ending(where Peter shoots himself and Fran jumps up into the whirling helicopter blades), but was never filmed.

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Summary: Dawn of the dread...
Review: The fans of this movie led me to believe this movie is the cat's meow but what i saw left me unhappy. The movie is very slow paced there is no real tension of the zombies because they are so slow you can out run them. And the acting is really bad is it intentional or not? The movie just dragged, later on they introduce the biker gang and it felt almost comical to see these guys attack the zombies. The zombies are not at all scary when you can slap them and throw pies in their faces the zombies are patethic monsters the gore is pretty good with a few scenes that stand out but nothing i havent seen done better elsewhere. I saw the new remake of this flick and i prefer it 100 times better over this flaming turd of a movie if slumbering dead people terrify you go ahead look at it i prefer my zombies running at me! This movie looks like it was made by film students with a decent budget. Bottom line this movie is good if your a fan of Romero's work, and if you want to see where todays zombie movie get their inspiration from. but nothing more. Critics give him to much credit for this movie, zombies as consumers, oh ok i get it...lame. Tom savini did some great gore effects but the make up effects on this were lame. I'm going to sell my copy of this movie and wait for a really good nail biter... the dawn of the dead remake. The original movie probably scared your parents, but it wont scare a jaded young audience.

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Summary: Dawn in it's Perfect Form.
Review: It doesn't bother me that this 1 disk edition will soon be replaced by a 3 DVD collector's set. It's good marketing, and the wait simply means the box is going to be that much better. Granted, we've been waiting a good long time for Anchor Bay to release their end-all-to-end-all box set, but if we get everything available, it should be worth the wait.

This is the 128 minute US Theatrical cut of the film, featuring what Romero felt was the best runtime, a good ballance between the gore, comedy, and character development, with the 'complete' score by The Goblins. The 139 min. version was rushed together to play at the Cannes Festival in 1978, and as such, is simply an extended rough cut. I'm personally glad that Romero can honestly state he likes a tighter, shorter version of his own film. If only most others could do the same, we wouldn't have to own each of their movies 10 times over - but, so is the game of "Director's Cuts". Remember, 'longer' doesn't always mean 'better', though it certainly can.

I'm personally hoping that the 3 DVD set coming in the fall will include Argento's "Zombi" cut, the Theatrical cut, and a whole lot of extras (Document of the Dead, maybe? I don't think Synapse has it anymore.), making it work with the single DVD rather than against it, but we'll just have to see.

I don't know what I can say about the film that hasn't been said before; excellent film, funny and action packed, holds it's own against the current dreck like Resident Evil and House of the Dead without even trying. The new Dawn, while not a total thrashing of the original (like, say, the new Texas Chainsaw Massacre), simply isn't half as good. Go with the original. You'll thank me for it if you ever get suckered in to watching the new one after viewing the original.

Anyhow, the DVD itself is great; Stunningly gorgeous 16:9 transfer, suprisingly good DTS audio, a brand new comentary, I think if fans didn't already know the box set was coming, they'd be on their knees thanking Anchor Bay for this marvelous DVD. But, for those of you who don't want to have to buy it twice, wait and see what the box brings. I have a feeling I'll own them both.

Romero's masterpiece deserves no less. Now, if only that new set would contain the 150 min. German composite print...

And, by the way. There is no alternate ending. It was written in the script that everyone dies, but never filmed for various reasons. If you want to see how much Romero's "Dead" films often veer off from how they were written, find the original screenplay for 'Day of the Dead'. It's barely recognizable compared to the finished film.

Getting 4 stars, only because we're sure to get a lot more fun when the box set comes out this Fall.

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Summary: Teresa's review
Review: DAWN OF THE DEAD IS WITHOUT A DOUBT THE BEST HORROR MOVIE EVER!!!
I HAVE HAD MANY, MANY ZOMBIE DREAMS SINCE 1ST SEEING IT IN 1980. I recently saw the remake, and I jumped out of my seat only once, during the bathroom window scene. The movie went downhill from there. Zombies move fast in the remake, and that's just WRONG!! People move slowly when they first wake up from sleeping, so imagine how slow people should move after waking up from being dead! Also, the best zombie in the original Dawn is Steven. What he does with his foot is CLASSIC! I highly recommend this film, the original 1978 version of course!!! Oh yea-I caught something in the remake-when the nurse was in the mall trying on clothes, I saw a sign above a mirror that said "Gaylen Ross"-she played Fran in the original! I guess that was their tribute to her. Wonder why Fran & Steven didn't make a cameo appearance like Roger & Peter did?

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Summary: Wait?.........
Review: Im cunfused. If this is the original directors cut that means they still didnt put all the things that were cut out right????
Cause I heard there is gonna' be a 3 disk dvd uncut versan coming out in august. WAIT SO I JUST NEED TO KNOW SOMETHIN.........IF ANY ONE CAN REVIEW THIS AN TELL ME WHAT I NEED TO KNOW...THIS IS WHAT i need to know.......

ALL THESE DOTD FILMS ARE ALL DIFFERENT CAUSE THERE IS SOMANY VERSANS.......DIRECTERS CUT....US CUT........DIVMAX VERSAN ECT.......ARE YOU TELLING ME NONE OF THESE VERSANS OF THE DVD OR VHS'S DONT HAVE THE ENTIRE FILM IN ITS UNCUT GLORY......CAUSE EVERy one is telling me that all the versans dont show the original ending where they all die. SO WAIT.......NONE OF THESE VERSANS HAVE THE ORGINAL UNCUT VERSAN INCLUDING THE ORIGINAL ENDING??/ WHAT THE HELL?!!! They make so many damn versans I cant choose which to get. SO I decided to get the original thearetical film on dvd. But I also heard that the 3 disk uncut versan has the original ending. Will this film come out in US also or Just the UK??? IF ANY ONE KNOWS ABOUT WHAT I TALKED ABOUT MAKE A REVIEW ON THIS AND TELL ME!

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Summary: Arguably the best zombie movie ever made
Review: Few filmmakers now how to do a zombie movie and get it right; I hate to think what the zombie movie genre would be without George Romero. 1968's Night of the Living Dead is still the archetype of zombie films, in my opinion, featuring a virtually perfect ending. 1979's follow-up, Dawn of the Dead, is another true classic, featuring scenes so shocking that absolutely no one under 17 could be admitted to theaters to see it. By today's standards, the film is hardly shocking at all, but Romero's up close and personal look at a nihilistic world simply crawling with the undead is the kind of movie that makes horror lovers stand up and cheer. The level of violence in this film is delightfully high; sure, it all looks pretty fake now, but in its day Dawn of the Dead helped lay the groundwork for later gorefests full of blood and guts.

I don't, as a general rule, care for zombies or zombie movies. Zombies are ugly and stupid - they basically just wander around in a clumsy manner, only reacting to the nearness of human life fresh for the taking (and eating). That's about all they do here, as well, but at least they turn out in huge numbers for this George Romero classic. We don't know what started the trouble; as the movie opens, the world is already in a heap of a mess. There are cops and soldiers killing zombies by the dozens, but it's obviously just a few bloods drops in the proverbial bucket.

TV news coverage features experts saying how bad everything is and how we should have taken action sooner, demanding people leave their self-barricaded homes and come together in a dwindling number of central locations. Roger DeMarco (Scott H. Reiniger) flies his girlfriend Francine (Gaylen Ross) and friend Stephen Andrews (David Emge) out of town in a helicopter - Stephen's sharp-shooting buddy Peter Washington (Ken Foree) also comes along for the ride. Low on gas and unsure of what they should do, the gang lands on the roof of a large shopping mall and eventually decides to hole up there for a while. Isolating themselves upstairs, our would-be survivors then begin making forays inside the mall for necessary supplies. The place is crawling with pasty-faced zombies, so they put together a plan that will, or so they hope, keep additional zombies from gaining access to the site; once that is done, it's just a matter of killing all of the zombies already stumbling around inside. Of course, as we all know, people are stupid, so this prolonged stay inside the mall faces its share of challenges and dangers. Along the way, countless numbers of zombies are shot, bludgeoned, and taken out with whatever deadly instruments one happens to find handy. Never fear, there is some zombie feeding as well, although once again I have to express my disappointment that no brains were ever eaten (zombies are supposed to eat brains - that's my personal zombie philosophy). One question hovers near the front of your mind throughout this film: how will it end? The world has basically come to an end, making for some long odds for our heroes' survival. While the ending is not completely satisfying, I do believe it makes for a right and fitting conclusion to this most extraordinary of horror classics.

Let me speak to the violence portrayed here. However shocking it was upon the movie's release, it really isn't shocking at all in this day and age; the quantity of violence, though still impresses. Plenty of zombies fall over the course of these two hours plus, but few of the "deaths" are what I would call gory. In many cases, a zombie takes a shot between the eyes and falls down; in some cases there is blood, especially when zombies get a chance to do a little feeding, but you certainly won't see anybody lying in a pool of blood. In many cases, a zombie gets taken out with no blood at all - certainly, the amount of gore you would expect from shotgun blasts to the head just doesn't exist here. The blood, I might also mention, doesn't even look like blood - unless red corpuscles changed to orange corpuscles without anyone telling me.

In the end, it comes down to this: Dawn of the Dead is one of the best zombie films ever made - more than that, it's one of the best horror films ever made. It cemented George Romero's name in the hallowed shrines of horror; it crossed the Rubicon (or perhaps I should say the river Styx) and dared to give viewers the quantity of senseless violence so many of us crave. There is also a sociological slant to the movie that many feel compelled to comment on (I personally think it's something of a stretch to classify four desperate, would-be survivors as some type of bourgeoisie enjoying the luxury the shopping mall affords them while the nameless hordes of plebeian zombies mill around aimlessly). However you want to interpret it, Dawn of the Dead is horror at its very best, up close and in your face.

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Summary: The original and the best !
Review: Forget the remake with Sara Polley,it sucks.This is the real deal! Long live George Romero!

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Summary: Dawn is one of the great horrors of all time
Review: Dawn of the Dead is truly a great film. Granted, it was low budget. Granted, the techniques for gore and make-up were not as advanced as they are now. None of that matters--in fact, it almost adds to the feel of the film. This is one of the most important horror films of all time, and is THE quintessential zombie film. Though not as widely known as Night of the Living Dead...Dawn delivered what people have come to expect from zombie movies--gore, human survival, creepy atmosphere, and that little blend of comedy. The chance to own it on DVD again is not something to be missed. If you don't already own a copy, I'd say get this one...but EVERYONE who is a fan of this movie should get the 2 or 3 disc set that is being planned for September. The Day of the Dead 2-disc was not something to be missed, and I'm sure this one will not disappoint!