"High-velocity-zombie at close range can damage the mind"

Rating: 10/10 (22 October 2008)

I can't recall whether there was any zombie-movie before this one, that accelerated the guys as seen here but it surely revived an ... well, at least "undead genre". To me it was a new impulse, a new element to present zombies rather like rabid-raging fast animals, than slow-mo man-eaters who mainly get dangerous in numbers; now even a single one can kill. That's new and cool.
There's basically not much to say about zombie-flicks, everybody knows the deal. The only question is: "Was it good or bad?" or to express it properly: "Have you been thrilled and entertained clever but without brains?" The answer here is simple and not negotiable: "Yes!"
If after only 10 minutes the whole neighborhood is burning down, the world tumbles into devastation and they are playing Johnny Cash, then... yes well, then I'm supposed to love the movie.
When I dragged my buddies into the theater (I had already seen it 2 days before), some asked me: "Man, are you certain? I don't know." I paused, smiled and just replied: "Trust me." In recent years I've come away of saying that, because it can end in a nosedive for the expertise-rep among one's friends. Here I was absolutely sure. It was the attacking girl which suddenly emptied all their popcorn-buckets after 6 minutes; theater-staff must have hated this film. After the end-credits they were all strung-out but happy; me too even by the second time.
Another good point here were a bunch of fine and not too known actors and also a script which allows the characters to avoid the typical horror-movie-mistakes we gotten annoyed of through the years: "Aw, Sally is gone. Let's all take flashlights, spread out in the woods and search her." Yeah. Right. Die you idiots. And take the authors with you. Or when finally an armory is found, this idiotic pattern to take a shotgun, bash the ammo-box on the table so all shells spread away, grab three shells into the pocket (instead of directly loading) and go, as seen for an instance in "Jurassic Park".
These guys are smarter, their ideas are good (see escape-plan), once in a gun-shop they're truly gearing up, and parts of the group finally only fail by a tragic accident (anyway: secure your working-space! I told you once, I told you twice...). The end leaves the survivors fate open; good for a sequel but not necessarily.
I'm pleased to see that the DVD is available since 2006 uncut for 8,- Euros (approx. 5$). Nevertheless I'd even say that "DOTD" is one of the few zombie-flicks which is recommendable to be seen on the big screen.
Other Recommendations: "28 weeks later", "Resident Evil I" (screw the sequels), "Rec" (Spain 2007), "Night Of The Living Dead" (1990), "Evil Dead II", "The Descent" (UK 2005, Hello Bigwolf ;-)), "Shaun Of The Dead (UK 2004).