by Anthony Lefty Clemente - College Of Staten Island
Imagine waking up one day for your normal daily routine. The same thing you do every day for a long period of time. Years of this get you into habits, where you rely on necessities, resources, friends, job, government. It is a rhythm we get into over this long period of time and we feel comfortable in it. Imagine one day this all just stopped. You wake up, and the world is turned upside down. All of your personal belongings, technology, loves and wants, gone. You turn on the news. The news reporter is telling the world that an unexplained phenomenon has occurred. Stay in your houses and lock your doors.....the dead are coming back to life. Not a bad concept if you were making a horror film. This was the idea behind George Romero's Dawn Of The Dead, the cult classic "zombie film" of 1978.
Dawn Of The Dead is an American horror film, which was filmed in 1978 in Pennsylvania. The concept behind the idea of the film was four survivors held up in at the time was one of the first shopping malls while the "walking dead" or "zombies" as we know them attempted to break in. The film is a favorite of fans of the horror genre, as well as the pinnacle for the majority if not all of the zombie style films that followed up to today.
Was Dawn Of The Dead just your ordinary blood and gore style horror film, or was Romero trying to give us a message?
George A. Romero is a filmmaker who is best known for his "Dead" series films, with his first being "Night Of The Living Dead" which was filmed in 1968. A black and white film, he keeps the set and story line simple: the dead are coming back to life and they are attempting to eat the living, where in this case we have strangers held up in a house in a frantic fight to survive. The film did have a strange twist of fate due to its ending. No one survived in the film based on the main cast members. No good guys defeating the bad guys, everyone died and the film pretty much well, ended. There were no MPAA rules at the time and at the time of the movie’s release, anyone of any age could purchase a ticket. This would later change with the releases of his other films, Dawn Of The Dead, and Day Of The Dead, which received R ratings, due to blood and gore.
The plot of Dawn Of The Dead appears simple, but throughout the film we are not exactly watching a “zombie” or “walking dead” type film that is based on hungry zombies looking for warm flesh. There is much more to this story if you look into it. The film opens up with one of our main characters, Francine waking up at a news station. The news is broadcasting the event that happened and shows arguments between “professionals” giving their opinion on the situation at hand and how the public can deal with it. This scene shows us our first look at how corporations / media thinks regardless of what is going on in the real world. The station manager wants to keep full reporting on the event and wants continuous postings of the available rescue stations in the area. Unfortunately we learn that some of these rescue stations are inoperable or have been taken over by the dead and in turn, the public should not go to these areas for safe haven. We see that this does not matter, because all the station manager is worried about is people tuning in to their station for ratings. Even with the possibility that the human race may be extinct in a short time, we see the Corporation/media Company trying to be ahead of the game. We meet our second main character, Stephen”, or better known as Fly Boy", who is there to rescue Francine via the station's helicopter. The immediate feel of Fly Boy is that of a sense of urgency and has a sense of what is going on with this event being reported.
We cut to our next scene where we meet our next two main characters, Roger and Peter who are both SWAT team members for the local police department. Their mission is to clear out a building that is supposedly hoarding the walking dead. This is the first scene of extreme violence, blood and gore that introduces us to the makeup effects used in the film. Although these special effects appear “comic like” they do make the viewer squeamish. The effects in this film are different than those of Night Of The Living Dead just from viewing the scenes in color film. "Cheesy" by today's standards, but for the time was done quite well.
From watching the film, we do realize we are watching a horror film due to its horror type characters and plot, which in this case is a virus or “zombie apocalypse” type setting. The mood is not that of a typical horror film. The lighting is what brings the movie to life, to which oddly enough show well-lit scenes. The scenes are colorful, and the music is playful at times, which is not typical of the horror genre. The majority of horror films scare us with poor low-lit areas so we feel the suspense of what will happen next. The majority if not all scenes in Dawn Of The Dead is out in the open with no real surprises, as we are still on the edge of our seats. The blood and gore is a bright red “ooze” which although does not look real at all, still shows a gruesome effect that may make the squeamish turns their heads. Typical gray and bluish faces are donned on extras through out the film acting as lifeless ghouls. Their only acting ability is that of a lifeless stare and a slight limp of walking aimlessly on set. Tom Savini, was in charge of the film’s makeup duties and also starred in a small role as a villain towards the end of the film.
As soon as we have our four main characters meet up for their hope of survival, we begin to really see the twists and turns of what surviving really means in this possibility of human extinction. They find a shopping mall and decide it will be good for a quick stop to recuperate. Based on mall history, “Shopping malls didn't just happen. They are not the result of wise planners deciding that suburban people, having no social life and stimulation, needed a place to go. The mall was originally conceived of as a community center where people would converge for shopping, cultural activity, and social interaction. It is safe to say that the mall has achieved and surpassed those early expectations. In today's consumer culture the mall is the center of the universe.” (Feinberg) Upon the establishing shot of the mall, we remain at this location for the remainder of the film. This is where we begin to see the true effects of American consumerism and more importantly, greed. After examining the mall they decide it would be a good place to hunker down for a while to see what their next move is. They have numerous obstacles to clear before the scene is safe, one being the clearing of the walking ghouls that found they inside. Unfortunately, one of our main characters insists he return for a dropped item outside the mall. We are not informed if this item was vital to his survival, but with the attempted retrieval of his belongings, he becomes bitten and infected with that of the disease they were trying to escape from in the first place. With their team now weakened, this makes their task more difficult, but they still succeed in their main objective, by encountering a firearm shop within the complex. " survivors indulge in a fantasy of purchase power. They "steal" money from the mall bank, cheekily posing for the security cameras; they take all the clothes and consumer goods they desire; they play video games" (Harper) Even with one of their own infected and issued a death sentence, the characters disregarded the ailing health of their comrade and the catastrophe going on outside. Roger eventually passes and turns into the walking dead and is killed by Peter. They decide to remain at the mall, and fortify their surroundings with a false wall blending in and hiding their location. This will play a major part at the end of the film. The group continues on, and we see the remaining three continue to build their empire, turning what once was a bunker for shelter into a what looked like a modern 1970s upper east side loft (without windows of course).
A good question to ask is, if they’re really was an apocalypse of sorts in real life, how would the public react? If we suddenly did not have electricity due to a solar flare attacking the earth and destroying the power grid, would people still break into electronic stores and still steal big screen HD televisions? We would not have a place to plug these televisions in, nor would we be able to use them, but the mere fact that they were available to us asks the question if people would take unnecessary items “just because”. Was this Romero's message to us? Are we just mindless and lifeless "zombies" that only worry about how much "stuff" we have more than our values and traditions? "America is now a “postindustrial” society and Americans define themselves by goods that they own rather than hard work and production. In this new society, the collection of goods is far more important than the production of said goods." (Powell) This mindless, lifeless zombie walk can be seen today just with our faces buried in cell phones walking down the street, not paying attention to our surroundings. As we see in the film Dawn Of The Dead, the ghouls mindlessly walk around the mall, not necessarily shopping for anything, but many references are made numerous times in the film by our characters (ie Francine asking Peter "Why are they here? What do they want?" to which Peter replies with "instinct".
Upon the continuation and conclusion of the film, we see that all things do come to an end. The 3 main characters left is seen by a group of raiders who come across the mall and wish to gain entry. With their original craftsmanship of putting up a false wall to blend in their hiding spot, they could very well have remained there, quiet, free from danger. The raiders do in fact gain entry, only to loot the mall of items, mainly of items they did not need to survive. Gang members are clearly seen taking electronics, gold plated dinnerware, and even jewelry and wallets off the walking dead. The mob mentality is grab what you can, regardless of what it is. The Survivors Empire is completely ruined and breached, destroying all the hard work they put in to make it their own. Peter and Fly Boy decide to access the situation, to which Fly Boy loses his cool murmuring under his breath "It's ours. We took it. It's ours" He fires a shot, which gives their position away. This is the beginning of the end for the mall, as well as the group. The mall is again infested with the walking dead, Fly Boy eventually gets bitten and turns, Peter and Francine leave the mall via the helicopter to their next unknown destination. Our closing credits plays a upbeat circus style musical piece with zombies aimlessly walking around the mall.
The film received numerous reviews, which the film received many positive reviews. The most notable being Ebert's, Variety and the New York Times. A remake of the film was done in 2004 by Zach Snyder, which closely followed the original screen writing of Romero. "One of the best films (horror or otherwise) of the '70s, "Dawn of the Dead" was the middle pic in Romero's famed, independently-produced zombie trilogy that began with 1968's seminal "Night of the Living Dead" and concluded with 1985's "Day of the Dead." Set in the throes of a mysterious outbreak that turned human corpses into flesh-eating drones, the original "Dawn" told of an unlikely band of survivors -- two police officers and a married couple -- who eventually holed up together in a suburban Pennsylvania shopping mall. At which point, the film became ingenious social satire touching on racism, classism, feminism and, above all, consumerism, as the vicious zombies clawed their way into the mall that, as one character famously observed, "was an important place in their lives." (Foundas / Variety)
Roger Ebert loved the film, stating "Dawn Of The Dead" is one of the best horror films ever made -- and, as an inescapable result, one of the most horrifying. It is gruesome, sickening, disgusting, violent, brutal and appalling. It is also (excuse me for a second while I find my other list) brilliantly crafted, funny, droll, and savagely merciless in its satiric view of the American consumer society. Nobody ever said art had to be in good taste." (Ebert)
The New York Times as well gave a positive review on the film, stating “Romero's excellent, multi-layered story combines high-adventure heroics, three-dimensional characters and explicit gore (by the always masterful Tom Savini, who plays a small role as a leering biker) to excellent effect. The subtext comparing the glassy-eyed behavior patterns of the ghouls to those of American consumers is clear, but not overdone” (NY Times review)
Like Romero’s first film, Night Of The Living Dead, one of our main characters is an African American male. For the times, African Americans were not main characters in films, to which as read in reviews, it was clearly known who was in the cast. The January 5th, 1967 film review of Night Of The Living Dead by Roger Ebert states with the opening scenes via his writing, “Inside the farmhouse, the girl discovers a young Negro who fights off the ghouls and starts to board up the house. Then it develops that five other people are hidden in the basement: Another teen-age couple, and a husband, wife and daughter. The daughter has been bitten by a ghoul and is unconscious.” (Ebert, 1967) With that said, we could have clearly just used the characters actual name, which was “Ben”. Ebert did go on to say he admired the movie, as well as give an enthusiastic review of “Dawn Of The Dead” An in depth review of the characters was not given in Dawn. With NOTLD being shown at inner city movie houses, there was a large black audience viewing his films. “There are, perhaps two intersecting theories about Black folks’ affinity with the Dawn film. The first explanation is that a decade earlier many of the theaters that showed Night were located in inner cities, serving a predominately Black audience. Perhaps access contributed to Blacks’ initial love affair with Romero. However, I think that proximity was just one part of what brought Black viewers to subsequent Romero films. The other key enticement was that Night had Ben! (Duane Jones) - a complex, emboldened Black starring character who was calm under fire, competently took charge of a deadly situation and who surprisingly kicked some (White) butt and took names. He provocatively provided a Black conqueror and more, through the hardy character Peter (Ken Foree), who survives the zombie plague and seeks safety along with a relative stranger-a very pregnant White woman (gasp!) Francine (Gaylen Ross)” (Coleman 2011)
Granted Dawn Of The Dead was not the first “zombie” film, (the first ever being the 1932 film “White Zombie” directed and produced by the Halperin Brothers related to voodoo) there has been numerous movies made after Romero’s dead trilogy. Films like 28 Days Later, 28 Weeks Later (2002 and 2007 by Danny Boyle) show the same concept of the dead or rage filled ghouls looking for flesh, but does not live by the original concept of Romero’s consumerism debate. Romero himself continued making zombie style films, with his next installations of Land Of The Dead, Diary Of The Dead and Survival Of The Dead. He received “based on” credits for the remakes of Dawn Of The Dead (2004) and Day Of The Dead (2008)
In the DVD insert of Dawn Of The Dead, Adam Rockoff writes about the film stating “Unlike many of his contemporaries, Romero never hid his desire to make a socially conscious horror film. In fact, he scoffs at those critics who have labeled his film an ingeniously disguised allegory; hordes of mindless zombies (read shoppers) descending upon a shopping mall because it appeals to something in their collective memory is about as subtle as a machete to the face. (Rockoff)
Clearly Romero has a love for horror and gore, and he does it well. Yet, anyone can throw some lifeless actors on a set and roll a movie camera showing them chase the living. What makes Dawn Of The Dead such a great film is clearly the point and message he is trying to show us. Is it a warning of the near future, or are we already there?
When there’s no more room in HELL, the dead will walk the EARTH.
References
Richard A. Feinberg and Jennifer Meoli (1991) ,"A Brief History of the Mall", in Advances in Consumer Research Volume 18, eds. Rebecca H. Holman and Michael R. Solomon, Advances in Consumer Research Volume 18 : Association for Consumer Research, Pages: 426-427.
Robin R. Means Coleman (2011) “Horror Noire: Blacks in American Horror Films from the 1890s to Present”, preface xvi
Americana: The Journal of American Popular Culture (1900-present), Fall 2002, Volume 1, Issue 2 http://www.americanpopularculture.com/journal/articles/fall_2002/harper.htm
Dawn Of The Dead review - BY ROGER EBERT / May 4, 1979
One Generation Consuming the Next: The Racial Critique of Consumerism in George Romero’s Zombie Films - Henry Powell, Colby College, 2009
Variety - Dawn Of The Dead movie review - March 18th, 2004 - Scott Foundas
NY Times - Dawn Of The Dead Review *date, and author not listed*
Dawn Of The Dead DVD insert review by Adam Rockoff
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