Wow! A remake worthy of the original!

Rating: 8/10 (29 August 2004)

Yep, it is rare that remakes do much for me. Usually they're crappily done rehashes that lose all of the original's charm and messages (if any). Either that, or they "re-imagine" the original (God, I hate that term!) and muck the original about so much that you wonder why they gave it the same name (eg. Battlestar Galactica)
But in DoD we get a movie that, like the original, is full of dark humour and menace, updated for today's audience. The original Romero version was good, and remains one of my favourites of all time. But this remake can stand proudly alongside it without feeling inferior in any way.
The plot is virtually the same. People fleeing from zombies hold up inside a mall and try to wait out the apocalypse. This version has a whole lot more characters, although I'm giving nothing away by saying most of them die, and a few new ideas thrown in.
The zombies owe more to Boyle's "28 Days Later" than they do to Romero's shambling originals. But that serves only to make them more menacing, since you can't necessarily outrun/outmaneuver them easily.
The characters are reasonably stereotypical. But it is nice to see a movie where the heroes have ordinary jobs and aren't all ex-Green Berets or Navy Seals. Just average Joes and Janes. In fact, the most competent (in this kind of situation) individuals are a cop and some security guards, and none of them are eager to take charge (except one of the security guys, and he's messed up).
There isn't a huge amount of character development. In fact, the aforementioned security guard undergoes the biggest development, losing his selfish attitude and becoming one of the more likable characters of the group.
Needless to say, the group diminishes in size as the film progresses, lost to the zombies mostly, though with the occasional accident thrown in for good measure.
There are a few things to mar this film. If you were trapped in a gun shop and had thousands of rounds of ammunition, wouldn't you just kill as many zombies from the rooftop as you could? What would be the point in not shooting them? Similarly, when using gas containers as bombs to be shot at as they lie on the ground, why not tape thousands of nails and screws to them and make them even more dangerous? But these are minor gripes more concerned with what I would do in that situation, rather than actual movie problems. In fact, most of the characters act with far more intelligence than you are used to seeing in a horror film, which in itself is a refreshing change.
But, on the whole, this film scores highly for entertainment and rewatchability. There's plenty of gore to keep the splatter fans happy and plenty of fear for the easily frightened to bite their fingernails at. Likewise lots of "Yeah!" moments to cheer at.
Easily the best movie I've watched this year.