Land of the Dead

kyoukan · Post by **kyoukan** » June 26, 2005, 3:55 am

Best zombie flick since the original Dawn of the Dead. Must see if you're into Romero's films or gore flicks in general.

Lots of genuinely funny jokes too (Pilsbury is the fucking man), but he laid on the Bush/Kaufman imagery a bit too much, but it was mostly satire rather than a serious attempt at social commentary. Lots of cool gimmick zombies too.

If you have the stomach for this kind of movie then you can't miss it.

Canelek · Post by **Canelek** » June 26, 2005, 3:39 pm

Fucking cool! I am so glad that Romero can still crank them out. I am going to see this Monday...I had watched Dawn and Day this weekend to get geared up for it.

If you don't have it yet, buy the Dawn box set--it has the US, Extended and Euro versions of it. Very kick ass. Savini did such a great job with the FX of the original Dawn with the budget.

weeeee

Bubba Grizz · Post by **Bubba Grizz** » June 27, 2005, 9:32 am

I really liked this movie but I have a problem with Dennis Hopper. I really like him but there is something about him that detracts from the story somewhat. It was tough to decide who was the bad guy in this flick really. Was it Hopper? The Zombies? or the Mexican guy?

Deward · Post by **Deward** » June 27, 2005, 10:09 am

I saw this friday night and I liked it. Not my favorite Romero film but it was still good. I am going to be interested in seeing what was cut out because I thought parts of the movie seemed a bit disjointed as if some important element had been cut out. It also seemed odd that the zombies, while not running, seemed a lot faster and were able to catch humans fairly easily. This was a major difference from previous Romero flicks and really changed the pace of the movie. Previous movies always had the the humans able to outrun the zombies or dodge them unless they were caught by surprise. There was a bit less suspense in this movie. I am impressed at what Romero was able to do with a $15 million budget though.

Overall I would rank it second or third next to Dawn and Night.

kyoukan · Post by **kyoukan** » June 27, 2005, 11:22 am

Bubba Grizz wrote:I really liked this movie but I have a problem with Dennis Hopper. I really like him but there is something about him that detracts from the story somewhat. It was tough to decide who was the bad guy in this flick really. Was it Hopper? The Zombies? or the Mexican guy?

There were no real antagonists. Just different people with their own perspective on survival.

masteen · Post by **masteen** » June 27, 2005, 11:29 am

kyoukan wrote:
Bubba Grizz wrote:I really liked this movie but I have a problem with Dennis Hopper. I really like him but there is something about him that detracts from the story somewhat. It was tough to decide who was the bad guy in this flick really. Was it Hopper? The Zombies? or the Mexican guy?
There were no real antagonists. Just different people with their own perspective on survival.

That was one of the things I kinda liked about the characters in Romero's flicks. People freak out under pressure and do some weird shit.

Bubba Grizz · Post by **Bubba Grizz** » June 27, 2005, 1:11 pm

I think I would like to see this as a TV series. One that would be played on HBO or Showtime where they can be as gory and such as they wanted without censor. It would definitely make me buy that channel.

Canelek · Post by **Canelek** » June 27, 2005, 6:41 pm

I just got back from seeing this. Once again, Romero steps out of the mold and delivers something worthwhile and entertaining. As a fan of the 'Dead series, I am very happy with what we have been waiting so many years for. Although it is a bit of a departure from the usual endings, I think it was appropriate to close the series out the way he did.

As usual, George and crew made the most of their budget and really scored on the makeup and gore effects. As for the story, I thought it fit perfectly with the ongoing theme since '68. I felt the hero/heroine characters were well fleshed out given the ~1:40 running time. Hopper's character was not as fleshed out as it could have been, but Dennis's personality gave the character enough life to be interesting nonetheless.

As for the usual trend for Romero to add an important society element--I think he nailed it without spelling it out for the crowd. You don't need to give too many clues these days about the parallel to our own society.

Great job all around on this one--I certainly will be heading back to watch it again on the bigscreen.

8/10 (would have scored higher given a longer running time and more 'badguy' development.)