Low expectations, high rewards...

Rating: Null/10 (26 March 2004)

Like many others, I wasnt too optimistic about the quality of this Dawn of the Dead remake, especially after heading rumours of it having a similar style to the Resident Evil film (which seemed to neglect the feel of the video games), but I was really surprised with the quality of the finished film. The remake opens far faster than the original, with less story background, and exposition, preferring to blow straight into the action from the start, which is a great thing I feel, because what would be achieved from explaining the well known story (started by Night of the Living Dead)? Instead, the film goes for edgy action for the majority of it's length, before exploding into all out war in the last 25 to 30 minutes (Remind you of Aliens anyone?), which really works in it's favour. The vicious, running and leaping zombies are genuinely unnerving, and some of the lead characters are engaging (admittedly, some of the less developed characters fall by the wayside in terms of characterisation), and the direction is stylish and effective. Overall, a well engineered, exciting thrill ride. But the big question is, how does it stand up to the original? I have a feeling this question is going to cause a lot of debate, for some time to come, because the 2 films are so hard to compare, (the plots only relate to each other because of the mall location really, the themes are totally different, and there are 25 years between each one) so it's probably best to take the new Dawn of the Dead for what it is: a totally new film, and a damn good one at that.