Happy Birthday, Uncle George!

What must it be like to invent an entirely new sub-genre of film? In my life time, I only know of one man to do so - George A. Romero. Romero turns 72 today and while his most recent entries in the "Living Dead" series pale in comparison to the first three, no one can deny that his contribution to modern Horror films is without comparison. 

Romero's movies aren't just about scaring audiences (though most of them do so quite effectively), but making them think along the way. Night of the Living Dead comments on racism; Dawn of the Dead on rampant consumerism and Day of the Dead addresses military oppression. Even the lesser and latter films in the series have something to say. Land of the Dead is about class and money, while Diary of the Dead is about obsessive artists and Survival of the Dead speaks to familial relationships. 

Uncle George

Of course, Zombies aren't Romero's only topics. One of my favorite Romero films is 1981's Knightriders, about a traveling group of entertainers who reenact medieval joust tournaments on motorcycles. It features the leading man debut of Ed Harris, and is the one of the first films I can remember seeing as a young man that features a positive representation of a gay character. His first of two collaborations with author Stephen King is the highly effective anthology Creepshow, which features a hilarious performance from Adrienne Barbeau as an obnoxiously pushy wife of a wimpy professor; King himself as man overtaken by an alien life force; Leslie Nielson and Ted Danson in a tale of infidelity, murder & revenge and a very creepy sequence involving cockroaches (my college friend Rich W. nearly lost his mind during that one).

1988's Monkey Shines tells the tale of a quadriplegic (Jason Beghe) whose genetically altered helper-monkey Ella, develops inappropriate feelings (and eventually murderous rage) for her 'master.'

In 1993, Romero adapted King's novel The Dark Half, about an author whose fictional pseudonym (possibly the soul of his twin who died in vitro), comes to life to take revenge after the author "kills' and buries him publicly. The Dark Half was written in response to King's outing as 'Richard Bachman,' author of 'The Running Man,' among other novels. Timothy Hutton, Amy Madigan, Julie Harris, Michael Rooker and my beloved Beth Grant star.

I haven't even covered Romero's early, 'smaller' indie films like Martin; The Crazies or Season of the Witch (AKA Hungry Wives); all of which are worth seeing, if only to track Romero's progression as both a writer and director.

Still, Romero's legacy will always be his "of the Dead" films, beginning with the 1968 classic that started it all, Night of the Living Dead.

I and hundreds of other film and Horror bloggers have written about this film ad nauseum, and none of us have anything truly new to say that hasn't already been said. Just know that had it never been made, AMC's amazing series "The Walking Dead" would never have existed. Nor would any number of other zombie movies (including the hilarious Shaun of the Dead and my own screenplay Army of the Dead), novels (Max Brooks' "World War Z") toys, calendars, blogs and even trading cards.

Happy Birthday, Uncle George. Your rabid fans will always love you for creating the sub-genre that continues to infiltrate and influence popular culture.

More, anon.
Prospero

There's Got to Be a Morning After (or 2)

Krishna failed to pull this guy up to Heaven by his ponytail.

I won't bother you again with the story of when I first saw Romero's Dawn of the Dead. Instead, I want to share my thoughts on the film (and Zack Snyder's 2004 'remake').

The events of Romero's version take place in the days following those of Night of the Living Dead. The world has been overrun by the reanimated dead, and as scientists argue over the cause and what should be done about it, Philadelphia newscaster Fran (Gaylen Ross) and her helicopter pilot boyfriend Stephen (David Emge) are planning on stealing the station's chopper to make their escape. Meanwhile, SWAT cops Peter (Ken Foree) and Roger (Scott Reineger) are sent into a Philadelphia tenement where they find a basement full of zombies, hidden by their loved ones who don't want to see their family members slaughtered. After killing dozens of both zombies and the living, the two decide they've had enough and meet up with Fran and Stephen to flee the city. After a scare while refueling the chopper, they come upon a shopping mall which they realize could serve as a sanctuary and land on the roof. They kill the zombies inside and risk going outside to block the mall's entrances with tractor-trailer trucks. It is during this risky operation that Roger gets sloppy and ends up bitten. They create a hidden living space and use the guns and food in the stores to create a mini-utopia for themselves. That is, until Roger succumbs to his wounds and reanimates. When Peter is forced to shoot his friend i teh head, they soon realize that their utopia is actually a prison, and begin to discuss leaving. Before they can, the mall is invaded by a gang of bikers, which include Romero himself (in a the Santa suit) and make-up effects innovator, Tom Savini. The bikers let hundreds of zombies in and Peter is bitten. When he reanimates, he leads the zombies right to the hidden living space, forcing Fran and Peter to the roof. As Fran waits outside, Peter contemplates suicide, but at the last minute fights his way to the chopper where he and Fran fly off with an unknown amount of fuel to an uncertain future.

Romero's film is notable for many reasons. First, Savini's effects: exploding heads; flesh being ripped off; intestines being pulled from stomachs and most infamously, the zombie ho gets the top of his head cut off by the helicopter's rotor. Second, like most of Romero's films, it makes a telling statement about blind consumerism and how people need to feel like they belong. As Peter says, "They're us, that's all."

Oh, Mom! You're so funny!

In 2004, director Zack Snyder (Watchmen; 300) 'remade' Dawn of the Dead. I used quotations here because the only thing the two films have in common is a shopping mall.

Snyder's film, from a screenplay by Slither director James Gunn, is set in Wisconsin and ignores the events of  Night... altogether. Nurse Ana (Sarah Polley) has just come off a double shift at a hospital which has seen an unusual number of bite victims. She briefly talks with her young  neighbor Vivian (Hannah Lochner) before heading off to an in-house date night with her husband, Luis (Louis Ferrreira). The next morning, Luis is awakened to find Vivian in their house. Before he can figure out what's going on, Vivian savagely attacks him, ripping out his throat with her teeth. Ana tries to save Luis, but he dies and is quickly reanimated only to attack Ana, who barely manages to escape to find that chaos has erupted in her normally quiet suburban neighborhood. After crashing her car, she meets up with Kenneth (Ving Rhames); Michael (Jake Weber); Andre (Mekhi Phifer) and his pregnant girlfriend, Luda (Inna Korobkina). The four make their way to a nearby mall, where they're basically taken hostage by a trio of mall security guards (Michael Kelly, Michael Barry and Kevin Zeigers). Soon, a panel truck filled with survivors shows up, including rich a-hole Steve (Ty Burrell); devoted dad Frank (Matt Frewer); his daughter Nicole (Lindy Booth), among others. They also discover Andy (Bruce Bohne), who is stuck in his gun shop, across the street from the mall. They communicate with Andy via whiteboard, playing chess and sending encouragement. It isn't long before folks start dying; Andy begins to starve and a reanimated Luda gives birth to a zombie baby. Deciding to escape on Steve's boat, they construct two zombie-proof vehicles and break out. After one of the trucks crashes and it's passengers die, the survivors make their way to an island in Lake Michigan, where things aren't much better. Foree makes a cameo appearance as a televangelist, reprising his line from the original: "When there's no more room in hell, the dead will walk the Earth."

Unlike the shuffling, shambling zombies in Romero's films, the zombies in Snyder's movie are fast and furious (like the 'zombies' in Danny Boyles' 28 Days Later), which made Romero furious. Romero would later make his disdain known in his "first-person" zombie film, Diary of the Dead, in which a young director yells at an actor playing a mummy: "You're dead! The dead can't run! They'd break their ankles!"

While an effective and exciting horror movie, Snyder and Gunn's version has none of the social commentary of Romero's film. Both films are terrifying, but they work on completely different levels. Uncle P, while no purist, actually prefers the Romero version, though that may have more to do with the circumstances under which I first saw it, more than anything. If nothing else, Snyder's movie proves that the rules of the genre (like many a horror story) are malleable and subject to the whims of the writer. In either case, the Zombie Apocalypse is not something I want to be around for. But if I am, I will be well-prepared.

More, anon.
Prospero

A Genre, Defined

Do These Colors Fit, Or What?

October 1st, 1968. A lucky audience attends the premiere of director George A. Romero's  horror film Night of the Living Dead and a sub-genre is born. Budgeted at a very modest (even for the late 60's) $114,000 and featuring a cast of talented unknowns, the movie would go on to earn an unprecedented $12M domestically and $18M internationally. It was decried by critics as "depraved" and "trash,' but embraced by an already war-weary counter-culture who saw it as an anti-war, anti-racism, anti-establishment movie.

Romero and his producing partner John Russo originally intended the movie to be a horror comedy about aliens who befriend local teens. A third draft of the script changed the aliens into "ghouls" and the teenagers into a group of strangers seeking shelter in a rural farmhouse.

Zombies had been around in horror movies since the 1940's but they were passive slaves, carrying out the bidding of their masters. They were the dead brought back to life by Voodoo magic, but had no wills of their own. While Romero's ghouls were also reanimated corpses, they were hardly passive, hungering for living flesh in any form they could find it. Audiences were alternately repulsed and fascinated as they watched the actors eat insects, rodents and butcher shop leftovers.

The plot was simple enough. Siblings Barbra (Judith O'Dea) and Johnnie (Russel Streiner) are visiting their mother's grave in a remote western Pennsylvania cemetery when Johnnie is killed (after teasing his sister that "They're coming to get you, Barbra!") by what appears to be a pale-skinned maniac of some kind. Barbra runs away in terror and finds herself at a farmhouse where she finds several half-eaten corpses. She runs outside, only to find more "maniacs' shambling towards the house. Suddenly, Ben (Duane Jones) pulls up and drags her back into the house, barricading them against the encroaching dead. They eventually find a family and a young couple hiding in the basement. As tensions mount, they soon find out that the entire Eastern Seaboard has apparently come under attack, the result of what one scientist believes is radioactive fallout from a satellite which exploded upon re-entering Earth's atmosphere. Featuring graphic violence; cannibalism; matricide; racial tension and redneck vigilantes, Night of the Living Dead was kind of sensational.

Uncle P first saw Night... in the mid-70's on a late-night broadcast from a New York station I managed to pick up with my paltry rabbit-ears antenna on an especially clear evening. I think I was about 12, or so and I was horrified, watching alone in my upstairs bedroom. I don't think I slept properly for several weeks. 

I don't imagine Romero and Russo set out to make a political statement or redefine horror movies. They just wanted to scare people. Romero's following films include Hungry Wives (AKA Season of the Witch), the anti-war The Crazies and the vampire-themed Martin, which were modest indie-film successes. It would be a full ten years before he made the truly genre defining sequel Dawn of the Dead in 1978. I may have already mentioned that I attended a midnight showing of Dawn...alone, as all of my friends were too scared to come with me. The theater manager came into the auditorium before the movie started and warned us that the film made people want to smoke and that smoking was not allowed. Almost as soon as the lights came down, joints were lit all over the place. So much for warnings. I drove home that night in my father's little brown Nissan, a little high from all the pot being smoked in the theater, shocked and delighted by what I had just seen... 

Night of the Living Dead has been remade twice since 1968; once by makeup FX pioneer Tom Savini (which featured a very different and girrrl-power ending) in 1990 and again in 2006 as Night of the Living Dead 3D. Savini's version is certainly worth a look, if only for it's revisionist ending, though the 2006 version has a completely different plot. A new 3D version, based on the original screenplay and featuring Tony Todd, has been announced for a 2012 release.While the Savini version is worth a look, it pales in comparison the original. I have not seen the 2006 version and will probably not see the 2012 remake.

A staple of Halloween parties and an essential in any horror movie collection, Night of the Living Dead is probably one of the most discussed, dissected and divisive horror movies ever made. To fans, it's simply the start of the sub-genre that  inspired AMC's phenomenal "The Walking Dead."

 More, anon.

Prospero

Brains?

This post probably belongs on the Zombie Zone, but I thought a Zombie story on CNN was more than worth a passing mention.

The story (here) is actually about the spread of viruses and how zombie movies, stories and novels use the model of a spreading zombie virus in a way that mimics the spread of actual known viruses. It also talks about the morphology of the human brain and how such a virus might quite effectively overtake our lower 'lizard' brains to most effectively sustain its hosts, as well as mentioning prions (essentially mutated proteins) such as the one which causes so-called 'Mad Cow Disease.'

We all know that the modern version of the flesh-eating zombie, seen in films like Zombieland and AMC's smash hit series "The Walking Dead" was created by writer/director George A. Romero in his groundbreaking 1968 low-budget thriller Night of the Living Dead. However, the specific consumption of brains didn't come about until Romero's former partner John Russo teamed with the late writer/director Dan O'Bannon (Alien; Dead and Buried) for 1985's comedic take on the genre, The Return of the Living Dead. Of course, now that the Horror sub-genre has achieved a massive pop-culture following, it may well be on the verge of losing its counter-culture status. And while a legitimate article on CNN.com may well prove to be the demise of the zombie as a sub-culture icon, I can't help but hope that Uncle P stood on the precipice with Romero and embraced a phenomena that was well ahead of its time. 

Perhaps the horrors of modern living (unrest in the Middle East; disease and famine in Africa; homophobia, xenophobia and germophobia in the U.S.) have contributed to our collective fear of a blind, genocidal disease waiting to take over and destroy life as we know it. Perhaps the inter-connectivity of the World Wide Web has left us numb to our own individuality. Or maybe we've finally come to realize what Romero said in one of his own films in his 'Living Dead' series: "They're us, that's all." Empty; hungry; mindless beings intent on self-fulfillment regardless of the cost to our own humanity. Honestly, if the cast of MTV's "The Jersey Shore" aren't inhuman self-involved zombies, then who is (or isn't)?

Or maybe I'm just full of crap. I leave it to you to decide.

More, anon.
Prospero

Shocktober Director of the Day: George A. Romero

With only 3 Shocktober posts left, it's time to break out the big guns and when it comes to modern Horror, one of the biggest belongs to none other than the father of the modern zombie film, George A. Romero.

In 1968, the Carnegie-Melon graduate made a low-budget exploitation film that shocked, thrilled and horrified, while giving rise to an entire subgenre. Of course, that movie was Night of the Living Dead. Shot for about $114,000 (an exceptional budget for an independent film in 1968), Night of the Living Dead has gone on to earn an estimated $12M. That's nearly 120 times the initial cost. Pretty remarkable for a movie shot on location in Pittsburgh with a cast of unknowns. So much has been written about this film (even by yours truly), that anything I might add here would be superfluous. Suffice it to say, when I first saw this movie (probably around 1975), it scared the crap out of me.

Romero followed up with a 1971 drama no one remembers, There's Always Vanilla, about a young man taking up with an older woman and 1972's Hungry Wives (aka Season of the Witch), about a bored housewife who takes up with a coven of witches. Neither movie was very good, truth be told. Then came 1973's The Crazies, about small town whose residents are turned into raving lunatics after an accidental chemical spill caused by the crashing of a secret military mission. Talky, preachy and militantly anti-Vietnam, The Crazies is still one of Romero's better early films.

The Crazies was recently (and decently) remade by director Brett Eisner, who wisely dumps most of the political elements of the original and concentrates more on the Horror.

Romero made a few TV documentaries (including one about O.J. Simpson) before his next genre film, Martin, about a young man (John Amplas) who believes he is an 84 year-old vampire. Creepy and effective, Martin is regarded by many critics as one of Romero's best films. Personally, I find it a bit depressing, but that's just me.

After martin, Romero made what most consider to be his masterpiece, 1978's sequel to Night of the Living Dead, Dawn of the Dead. Picking up where Night... left off, Dawn of the Dead is the story of a small group of Philadelphians who hole up in a western PA mall while the zombie apocalypse rages on outside. When a group of bikers (led by SFX man Tom Savini) breaks in, all hell breaks loose and the 'family' must find a way to survive. Released without an MPAA rating, I saw Dawn of the Dead alone, because my friends were all too scared. Taking on mindless consumerism amomg other social topics, Dawn of the Dead  is a classic for many reasons, and not least of all Savini's then state-of-the-art physical makeup effects.

Director Zack Snyder (300; Watchmen) eschews the social commentary in his mostly excellent remake, and creates one of the most intense opening sequences ever. Romero followed Dawn with the 1981 motorcycle jousting movie, Knightriders. Starring Savini, Amplas and a very young Ed Harris, Knightriders is one of the first films I can remember in which a gay character is accepted and loved for he is, all while taking a modern spin on Arthurian legends. Knightridersi is actually one of my favorite of Romero's movies, despite its rather silly premise.

Then came 1982's Creepshow, an anthology movie written by Stephen King, loosely based on the Horror comics of the 50's, starring Ted Danson; Leslie Nielson; Hal Holbrook, Adrienne Barbeau; Fritz Weaver; E.G. Marshall; Savini; King and Harris in five short tales of terror. I saw this movie with my then 15 year-old sister and my boyfriend. Guess who ended up screaming like a little girl? Hint: it wasn't me or my sister.

1985 saw the next entry in Romero's Zombie films, Day of the Dead, about a group of scientists and military personnel in an underground Florida bunker, ostensibly searching for a cure. Like Martin, Day of the Dead is rather talky and very anti-military, though it introduces the concept of a zombie who retains at least the most rudimentary memories in the character of "Bub."

1988 saw the ridiculous Monkey Shines, starring Jason Beghe, Stanley Tucci and Janine Turner in a story about a -- wait for it -- homicidal helper monkey. Not a highlight in Uncle George's career.

1990 saw the forgettable Two Evil Eyes with Italian director Dario Argento followed by 1993's The Dark Half, another King adaptation about a writer who symbolically kills his nom de plume, only to find the nom de plume may not be ready to die. King based the novel on his own experience writing under the name Richard Bachman. The movie isn't terrible, but still not up to Romero's best.

Bruiser, another unremarkable effort, was Romero's 2000 film, followed by 2005's Land of the Dead; his first big-budget Zombie movie. Starring Dennis Hopper, John Leguizamo; Simon Baker ("The Mentalist"); Asia Argento and Robert Joy, Land... is movie about the Haves and the Have-Nots, and is probably the least successful of the Dead films.

In 2007's Diary of the Dead, Romero returns to both his indy and Pittsburgh roots, while jumping on the hand-held camera bandwagon started by The Blair Witch Project. In this story about about of group of University of Pittsburgh film students making a Horror movie when the Zombie Holocaust breaks out, Romero finally remembers how grim and hopeless such an outbreak would be and his cast of unknowns deliver some truly excellent performances. And that's not to mention some of the most inventive zombie kills since Dawn...

I have not seen 2009's Survival of the Dead, the first direct sequel in Romero's Dead series, though I am left to understand from others who have that it lacks the impact of his previous films.  

Romero's next announced project is a remake of Dario Argento's giallo classic Deep Red, though he has been quoted as saying there is at least one more Dead story left to tell. While he may be aging (as are we all), I hope that Uncle George has one last great Zombie movie left in him. It would be a shame to see a Horror franchise that started over 50 years ago die with a whimper.

Of course, Uncle P has a Zombie script or two up his own sleeves, in case Uncle George is reading...

More, anon.

Prospero

Review: "The Crazies"

In George A. Romero's 1973 original The Crazies, his follow up to Night of the Living Dead, Judy and David are a young couple caught up in a military cover-up when a man-made virus is unleashed on a small Pennsylvania town which drives its victims insane before killing them. In Breck Eisner's 2010 remake, Judy is a doctor and her husband David is the Sheriff in a small Iowa town that has been infected by a man-made virus which drives its victims insane before killing them. That's basically where the similarities end.

Ogden Marsh is small farming town, dependent on the local water supply to irrigate the corn fields which the town in the black. It's 1200 or so residents all know each other and everyone turns out for the opening day game of the local high school baseball team, including the town's reformed drunk, wearing a blank expression and toting a shotgun as he deliberately walks onto the field in the middle of the game. And thus begins the town's rather quick descent into chaos as more and more of its citizens become infected and start killing one another.

Sheriff David Dutton (Timothy Olyphant) and his deputy Russell know something's really wrong when the phones and Internet are suddenly useless (not to mention the fact that the M.E. tries to cut David's head open with a bone saw in the back room of the local funeral home). David tries to convince his wife Judy (Radha Mitchell) to leave for her sister's, but she refuses, knowing the town will need its doctor to help them through this crisis. But before she can, the military descends on the town and starts rounding people up at the high school, separating those with fevers from those without, and separating the pregnant Judy from David, who is shipped off to nearby truck stop and presumably, evacuation. Determined to save his wife, David returns to town where they, along with Russell and Judy's assistant Becca (Danielle Panabaker), try to get out without being killed by the infected or shot by the military.

The screenplay by Scott Kosar (The Amityville Horror) and Ray Wright (Pulse) dispenses with the talky dialog of Romero's original and director Breck Eisner keeps the pace moving along briskly while providing plenty of tension and just the right amount of shocks without going into overkill. Olyphant (The Broken Hearts Club; Live Free or Die Hard) is fine here, displaying enough swagger to be convincing as a sheriff (a role he is about to take on on FX's new series "Justified"), while retaining the right amount of sensitivity for a devoted husband and father. Mitchell (Pitch Black; Silent Hill) continues to prove more than capable as a genre actress. The rest of the cast are all fine and by dispensing with the fervent anti-military themes of the original (made at the height of the Vietnam War), Eisner manages to evoke both nightmarish chaos and quiet, dark-ride tension quite effectively. The military are still the real bad guys here, but this film is more about surviving the unthinkable, than placing blame for it.

As with any good horror movie, you have take The Crazies at face value and accept it for exactly what it is: a fun, exciting and (while often improbable) believable ride. **1/2 (Two and a Half Stars Out of Four). The Crazies is rated 'R' for violence, gore and language.

More, anon.
Prospero

Zombie-palooza

As regular readers must know by now, I have an... um... okay... obsession... with zombies. And this still from the latest by zombie master, George A. Romero's now officially titled next film Survival of the Dead (via) proves that zombies are here to stay. In fact, there are probably dozens of zombie movies slated to screen in 2009, alone. Indeed, I've even written my own zombie movie screenplay (currently listed as #5 in the Top 5 Screenplays on Scriptbuddy.com - help a brother out and rate it so it sells).

Anyway, there are lots of zombie movies slated for release this year. Some I've posted about before; others are new to me. All of them look like loads of fun for horror fans.

So, in no particular order, below you will find the trailers for the zombie movies to which I am most looking forward to seeing in the coming months (some of them are even gay).

Just a warning, many of these trailers contain disturbing images that are not appropriate for younger viewers or those of a sensitive nature.

Zombies of Mass Destruction:



Dead Snow:



Yesterday:



Silent Night, Zombie Night:

And finally, the big budget Zom-Com which combines two of my favorite things (Zombies and Theme Parks) in one film, Zombieland:

So, if you love me as much I love ya'll, please visit http://www.scriptbuddy.com/ and rate my screenplay. I can't promise anyone a role, but I can promise my undying love and thanks.

More, anon.

Prospero

One Last (for a while) Zombie Post

I knew I was on a zombie kick for a reason. Today is the birthday of the Father of the Living Dead, director George A. Romero. Every genre fan knows the story of how a cast-financed movie not only became a cult classic, but inspired an entirely new and enduring sub-genre. No matter how many other writers or directors approach the subject; no matter whether you prefer slow zombies or fast (I'm the slow, shambling zombie kind a guy - they're much funnier); whether in English or Italian; none of them would exist without Papa George.

And while he's made some other, pretty terrific genre films (Martin; The Crazies; Creepshow; Monkeyshines; The Dark Half) and was Executive Producer for the syndicated anthology show "Tales from the Dark Side," Romero's legacy will always be his films of the mysteriously resurrected dead, unstoppable in their hunger for living flesh. I suppose there are far worse things to be known for. Happy Birthday, George!

Prospero

I Been Zombie-fied!

Here is a link to a story that made me laugh, a whole lot:

http://pinkisthenewblog.com/home/2009/01/caution-zombies-in-austin-tx/

It also made me ask myself, why are zombies so damned popular? George Romero's 1968 film Night of the Living Dead basically started an entire sub-genre of horror films. Since then, there have been countless imitators and extrapolators. There are zombie clubs, zombie crawls, zombie flash mobs and even zombie weddings. Danny Boyle invented the "fast-zombie" in 28 Days Later and Zack Snyder followed suit in his 2005 update of Dawn of the Dead. Mel Brooks' son, Max, wrote the hilarious "The Zombie Survival Guide" and the overrated "World War Z" (currently in pre-production) and even Romero is at work on his sixth film in the series, currently titled ...of the Dead.

So what is so fascinating about the Living Dead? For me, it's the humor (both intentional and non) that permeates the genre. Dark and grim? Certainly. Hilarious? Without a doubt. Zombie movies allow us to view ourselves in a different light; stripping away the civility and moral decency we afford ourselves and reducing human beings into little more than mindless consumers, bringing about our own destruction through the depletion of our resources. When everyone is dead and there is no living flesh left on which to feed, won't the zombies eventually starve and rot away, giving rise to the Giant Cockroach Society which will eventually rule the planet? But I digress.

I think that it's a case of "We have seen the enemy and they are us." The modern flesh-eating zombie is our worst nightmare - a mindless eating machine intent on one thing and one thing only: eating you. Our souls in question; our violence increased and our hunger insatiable, the zombie represents all that is Id and none that is Super-Ego. In other words, us without self-control, the only thing that truly separates us from the lower species.

Or, maybe we just love seeing some blow-hard know-it-all get torn in half, screaming "Choke on 'em!" as he watches his legs get dragged away.

So, thank you, George Romero, for inspiring a genre and many a nightmare.

More, anon.

Prospero.