As entertaining as the original

Rating: Null/10 (17 March 2004)

I'm one of those guys that think you can't have enough zombie movies, so amidst the moans from die-hard fans of George Romero's `Living Dead' films that viewed the Dawn of the Dead remake as sacrilege, it didn't really bother me much. I mean I can understand the concern. Just like Batman fans felt that Michael Keaton was going to screw it all up, seeing a modern Hollywood take on one of the most beloved horror films of all time written by the guy who scripted Scooby Doo would certainly make the most optimistic filmgoers leery.
Can you really blame people for being skeptical? After seeing hacked out rehashes of The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, uninspired Freddy and Jason nonsense, why would one think that the new version of Dawn of the Dead would be any better? In the years of swirling rumors about the project within the horror fan community, fears of a light on the gore giggle fest with a pop music soundtrack would just amount to a giant pile of suck. I'm happy to say that you can put your fears aside and welcome this film with open arms. Simply stated, it kicks some major ass.
The pedigree of cool goes up several notches as you hear Johnny Cash come back from the dead himself, singing `The Man Comes Around', amidst the chaos. There's no lengthy setup here, the female protagonist, Ana (played wonderfully by Sarah Polley) simply wakes up in a messed up world where the dead eat the living, and quickly turn them into flesh eating zombies. And these aren't the shambling sleepwalking souls from Michael Jackson's Thriller video, but strong, fast zombies, that sprint their asses off while they chase cars down the street.
She finds refuge with a small band of survivors, who inevitably holes themselves up in the local mall. It's the mall that was the poetic focal point of the original. A symbol of how we're all shuffling around like zombies in giant shopping establishments, even before we're dead. In first time director Zack Snyder's hands, it's merely a place to blast apart some zombie brains. And that's not a bad thing.
With the unrelenting violence in Mel Gibson's recent tribute to another living dead legend generating more than a quarter of a billion dollars in ticket sales, America is perhaps ready to see insanely violent films that haven't really had their heyday since the late 70s. Though it goes a little easy on the stomach churning cannibalism that made the original so special, there's no shortage of brain showers and blood spatters in this one.

The remarkably creative violence is unrelenting. Heads are blown to bits, sticks shoved through skulls, chainsaws cut off scores of limbs at a time, and my favorite of them all involved a white truck mowing down a dozen zombies, each of which left a giant red jelly splat of blood when their heads smacked against it.
The cast is varied, complex, and often humorous, without being over the top. Ving Rhames is a more than worthy successor to the original film's badass, Ken Foree (who has a nice cameo in this one that will warm the hearts of those who remember), while Jake Webber and Mekhi Phifer have surprisingly good performances as well. Michael Kelly does an amazing job as an a**hole Mall security guard named `CJ' who is a delicious jerk.
Though the film bathes in violence throughout, it's a necessary and occasionally hilarious way to deal with the unreal and mind-bending situation they're all in. I mean when you've got thousands of zombies waiting to eat you in the shopping mall parking lot, you've gotta have a little fun to keep your sanity. While passing the time by `talking' to a lone survivor on a faraway rooftop via dry erase boards, they play a game of Celebrity Zombie Shootout, challenging him to play target practice with the living dead that resemble famous people. Hopefully Jay Leno, Burt Reynolds, and Rosie O'Donnell won't get too p**sed when they see this.
While I'm impressed with the lack of restraint used with the violence here, I'm equally amazed that the filmmakers made the difficult decision to avoid excessive product placement in the film. To set a movie of this nature in a shopping mall, and not use a single real store was a refreshing site. Aside from some well known bottles of water, there was little other recognizable merchandise in the movie.
Tom Savini, the gore makeup legend who handled the gore chores in the original film has an entertaining cameo as a cop who's telling a news crew how they have to shoot the zombies in the brains and burn them. He points out an unfinished kill on the road with, `Ah, there's a twitcher' before he has her disposed of on live TV. Matt Frewer of Max Headroom fame has a nice guest appearance as well.
This is the horror film I've been waiting Hollywood to come out with for a long time. And though I may get struck by a bolt of lightning by St. George, I'll go out on a limb and say it's as enjoyable as the first.
Dawn of the Dead is going to be a huge hit, and hopefully will give `The Dead' films such a great shot in the arm, that Romero may actually get the right funding and creative control to make his long awaited fourth installment in the saga.