Excellent movie, but not worthy of the moniker.

Rating: 8/10 (26 March 2004)

It is certainly refreshing to see a movie like Dawn of the Dead is doing so well in the box office. This movie was beautiful in it's presentation of the apocalypse, full of dramatic camera angles, pulse pounding situations, and a realistic view of how people would act when faced with almost certain doom.
With the above being said, it doesn't deserve the name Dawn of the Dead. Despite the originals obvious shortcomings, i.e. cheesy make-up and techni-color blood, the originals story was much better. It's presentation is stark, which in my opinion adds to the realism. And the original is much gorier, which is part of the reason I see zombie movies to begin with.

The similarities between the two movies are weak, basically being trapped in a mall, and the strong characters being a woman and an African-American the only similarities (for those of you who are younger, this really was an important issue back in 1978, with the original Dawn of the Dead getting praise for it use of different types of heroes). The monsters of the new film, and the zombies of the old are not even comparable; they are completely different in their nature.
I congratulate the makers of this film for what it was. I wish it would have been released with a different name, since I feel it still would be successful.
My rating is an 8/10.