Dawn of the Dead

Plot synopsis:
Tensions are running high in the United States. The recently deceased are returning to life as shambling, flesh-eating ghouls, and political dissidents are threatening social stability. In the city of Philadelphia, Fran (Gaylen Ross) an employee of WGON-TV and Radio learns that her program director Givens is broadcasting out-of-date information about rescue stations that have been overrun by the living dead. Fran's boyfriend Stephen (David Emge), who pilots the station's traffic helicopter, arrives at the station and tells her that they must escape in order to survive. He plans on stealing the station's helicopter and tells Fran to meet him on the roof at 9pm.Meanwhile, in another part of Philadelphia, the city's SWAT team is preparing to launch an assault on a low-income tenement building filled with refugees who refuse to leave their homes for emergency shelters; they also refuse to give up their dead, both deceased and re-animated, harboring them in the basement of the tenement. After gun battle with armed bandits on the roof, the police and National Guard soldiers break into the building using tear gas. Roger (Scott H. Reiniger) one of the SWAT troopers, becomes disgusted by the bloodthirsty behavior of some of their fellow SWAT members when one of them goes crazy and begins shooting at both zombies and innocent bystanders. A tall figure in a gas mask shoots the rogue officer dead. Roger retreats to the basement to escape the confusion, but the tall figure follows him. He removes his mask and reveals himself to be an imposing man named Peter (Ken Foree). They have talk for a few minutes and agree that the zombie plague will only get worse. Roger tells Peter about his friend who has a helicopter; he plans to leave with Stephen and Fran, and suggests Peter join their escape. A priest emerges from a room in the cellar; the man is missing a leg and walks with a crutch. He tells them that he has administered the last rites to the dead people in the next room, and that the soldiers may now "do what they will" with them. Peter and Roger kill all the zombies in the cellar, the gravity of the situation nearly overcoming them.Meanwhile, Stephen and Fran arrive in their helicopter at an abandoned police station pier on the Delaware River to refuel and wait for Roger to show up. They are surprised when four rogue policemen arrive and threaten them for looting the place. Roger and Peter arrive and the rogue cops back down allowing the four to go on their way. Stephen and Fran are surprised that Roger has brought someone with him, but they agree to take Peter with them. The four of them fly all night.In the morning, Stephen lands the helicopter at a small, deserted rural airport depot to refuel. While exploring the area, zombies attack them from out of nowhere. Stephen tries to prove his manliness before Fran -- who is carrying his child -- but he is both clumsy and a poor shot. Roger has to kill the zombies Stephen weakly shoots at, and Stephen nearly kills Peter when aiming for a zombie.Later, while in the air again, they see a deserted shopping mall. They land on its roof and break in through a skylight to rest and to collect supplies. The place is full of zombies milling about inside, drawn to a place that had meant so much to them when they were alive. Despite the growing number of undead outside, the four refugees realize that they could survive there for a long time. It even has a gun shop so they will be able to find weapons to defend themselves. Using the mall's floor plans and master keys, Peter, Roger and Stephen race around the mall, collecting the supplies they will need to make a home. They take these supplies to an upstairs area where they and Fran build a home in an annex of former offices and storage rooms. Fran is resistant to the idea; she thinks it is a bad idea to leave what is left of society, but perhaps because she is pregnant and wants to do what's best for her child, she stays.They realize they need to rid the mall of zombies. A decision is made to block the entrances to the mall with semi-trucks from a nearby warehouse. While Stephen watches from his circling helicopter, Peter and Roger hotwire the trucks and drive them to the mall. Peter is disturbed that Roger seems to be losing his grip on reality; he becomes arrogant and takes unnecessary risks in order to demonstrate his mastery of the situation. Unfortunately, he is bitten by zombies while trying to get into one of the trucks. They all realize that Roger's wound will prove fatal, as nobody can survive a bite for more than a few days. Fran is conflicted; she wants to take Roger to a medical facility, but the others won't hear of it. They are convinced Roger is doomed but decide to let the "disease" run it's course.Over the next several days, they begin to make the mall their home. They care for the ailing Roger as best they can, but his condition rapidly deteriorates until it is clear he is on the verge of death. Peter builds a fake wall in front of the only hallway that leads to their home, disguising it from any potential looters that may come through the area. They monitor a television to see if the zombie crisis ever ends but the news is dismal. Roger makes Peter promise to kill him if he comes back as a zombie, because he tells Peter he's going to try not to return. Roger does return, however, and Peter is forced to shoot his animated corpse in the head. They bury Roger inside of a large planter that houses decorative palm trees inside the mall.One night Peter prepares a romantic dinner for Fran and Stephen. When Peter leaves them alone, Stephen proposes marriage to Fran. Fran declines, saying that they can't make that kind of commitment given what has become of the world. "It wouldn't be real," she explains.Eventually, all television transmissions cease. The remaining three bicker as their sense of isolation gets stronger. Fran demands to learn how to fly the helicopter in case anything were to happen to Stephen. But when he teaches her how to fly it, they are spotted by a gang of motorcycle-riding survivalists.That evening, the survivalists/looters approach, coveting the supplies inside the mall. They try to contact Peter, Fran and Stephen by radio, but Peter is smart enough not to respond. He knows that they will be killed if the survivalists find them. His plan is to let the looters break in and take what they want, then leave, betting that they won't find the camouflaged entrance to their home. The looters break into the mall, and zombies flood in with them. Stephen, believing that the mall belongs to him and his friends, sneaks into the mall and tries to shoot the bikers, who return fire. With no choice but to help his friend, Peter creeps through air shafts, picking off isolated bikers and zombies. Unable to cope with both Peter and the zombies, the bikers decide to leave. Before they do, two of them enter the elevator where Stephen is hiding on top, and begin blindly shooting, severely wounding him. He is later attacked and bitten by zombies, and dies in the elevator. In the mall, the zombies corner and eviscerate several of the remaining looters.Peter returns to the hidden fortress and waits with Fran; they are unsure if Stephen has survived, but they know he will return either way. Now a zombie, Stephen remembers how to get through the hidden wall to the storeroom. He leads the horde of zombies up the stairwell. When Stephen appears, Peter kills him. He tells Fran to leave, but he refuses to go with her. He helps Fran onto the roof, where she prepares the helicopter. Peter stays in the storeroom, waiting for the zombies to flock in and planning to shoot himself before they can grab him. But at the last minute he decides he wants to live and fights his way through the zombies to the helicopter. Fran delayed taking off until the last possible moment, and Peter is able to hop into the helicopter. The two fly off to an uncertain future, with little fuel left.

Tags: comedy, suspenseful, grindhouse film, murder, cult, horror, violence, good versus evil, absurd, action, satire, claustrophobic, revenge, entertaining, sadist

Review:
Dawn of the Dead is one of the best zombie apocalyptic movies of all time, I highly recommend this film to any horror fan..
It's not just one of the towering horror films, or horror comedies (what will a poor dead fellow do when the escalator starts?!) but one of the great sequels, more ambitious and ass-kicking than its predecessor, with a filmmaker more confident and technically proficient with his abilities.Romero didn't originally want to do *any* sequel to his original 'Night', but after a visit by some friends to a soon-to-open mall nearby his hometown of Pittsburgh, it struck a chord as to who would be coming here – and what so much consumerism in one place would mean.
This was an important part of their lives," he responds.I don't think necessarily Romero meant to show the film as any sort of 'This is what will happen!" type of social horror thing.
Romero acts as both pessimist and optimist in this world though; past all the chopped limbs, exploding heads (oh yeah!), Tom Savini stunt and make-up and intestines ripped apart, what holds up the film for me is seeing these four characters come to grip with the horror they've made for themselves, holding up in this "paradise" of a mall.Balls-to-the-wall horror, social horror, and some genuine paranoid horror stuff (note to self, never try and fire a gun at a single zombie when in a dark room full of electrical wiring and pipes), and plenty of rock and roll attitude, this is a personal favorite and the most entertaining horror film of its time.
Thoughtful if unsubtle epic follow-up to Night of the Living Dead was one of THE influential movies of the late 70's; pity, then, that the people it influenced paid more attention to the amped-up gore than to the sense of contained hysteria that makes what should be tough going (there are basically three scenes in this movie: zombies attack people, people attack zombies, people stand around talking) a uniquely involving and provocative self-analysis of the zombie film.The symbolism is, well, not delicate.
Romero's no-budget horror movie Night of the Living Dead hit screens in 1968, the same year that had already given audiences the all time genre classic Rosemary's Baby, no one could have predicted the indelible effect it would have on the history of cinema.
The mall provides fodder not only for the film's well known social commentary, but also for some truly thrilling-if not terrifying-setpieces.With its graphic depictions of human evisceration, exploding heads, and gruesome flesh eating, Dawn of the Dead may well be the goriest American film of all time.
Dawn of the Dead is a truly stunning example of the horror genre's ability to produce works that are as socially relevant as they are terrifying, films which break free of the constraints of conventional horror movie elements and in doing so establish themselves as being truly timeless.
By 1978, that political anger is gone, and America has reverted to being a race of consumer zombies, congregating around massive shopping malls like they're the religious temples of the Incas, trapped there not by the freedom of choice of capitalist propaganda, but mindless instinct.the zombies are supposed to be the enemy, the Other in conventional horror terms, but the first thing the so-called heroes do on landing at the mall is substitute urgent survival for gleeful consumerism (compare with the very similar silent fantasy, 'Paris Qui Dort').
Reality ceases to exist; there are some beautifully surreal scenes, as our heroes make homes in showrooms.The mall sequence as a whole has a Bunuellian savagery about it, and the film builds up an aggression like the characters until all is chaos - tones, modes, genres all colliding, the 'reality' or 'integrity' or, even, 'seriousness' of the film as much in question as the modern world the protagonists live in, where even time seems to stand still, the weeks of the action compressed into the framework of a day, with the night of the living dead giving onto the dawn.
Romero's "Dawn of the Dead" is one of the chosen few, absolute greatest horror films ever made and it's fairly unimaginable that a powerful movie like this will ever come out again.
He already did that in "Night of the Living Dead" but "Dawn" is entirely different film all together, since it contains a lot more humor and intelligently subtle society-mockery.
For instance, the exploding head scene was revolting, and most of all, the intestinal feeding scene when a biker is torn apart was repulsive; I couldn't watch as his guts were graphically shown ripping apart.Aside from those two unfortunate aspects, I strongly encourage you, rather you HAVE to, watch "Dawn of the Dead." Thrilling and suspenseful thanks to extremely distinct characters, whose fate you hope a happy one, and grippingly socially relevant, this is a unique horror, or really of all genres, treasure..
OK I just got done watching this and it was great this is the first movie I have seen in the United States Of America that I had not seen in the United Kingdom I have seen "DAWN OF THE DEAD" I just never seen the Euoropean version under the tittle "ZOMBI" instead of the tittle "DAWN OF THE DEAD" this is the version done by Dario Argento and it was great I liked it a lot more than the other versions the music in this was different and the sound effects are different and there are some different scenes than the other version I first saw about a year or two ago.
Romero ("Night of the Living Dead") has with "Dawn" created the most ambitious and most satisfying movie of his entire career.
It succeeds on so many different levels that people who really don't even enjoy horror films all that much should like it, and yet there's a wealth of scares, suspenseful scenarios and bloody Tom Savini gore effects to keep the horror fans thoroughly entertained.
Romero's epic sequel to his classic Night of the Living Dead (1968) is an equally classic, and equally excellent film!As the zombie plague sweeps the nation, four refugees escape to a shopping mall where they plan to hide out.
But how long can they keep out the ravenous flesh-eaters or the outside world?With it's great direction, satirical humor, gripping story, and merciless gore, Dawn of the Dead ranks as one of the greatest horror films of the 70's.
Romero makes not only a terrific horror picture, but a clever social commentary with this film as he compares the zombies to the every-day shopper!
The exciting parts of this movie work because they don't move fast, allowing the protagonists to do things that fill the film with interesting possibilities, like what would it be like to live in a shopping mall with no customers and nobody charging you for anything?
Romero, main characters: Stephen, Peter, Roger and Francine.Plot: Four survivors trying to survive in a shopping mall amidst a living dead apocalypse.
It left me stunned and speechless and thoroughly convinced it was the worst film of all time; I've since seen worse movies (like George Romero's Knightriders and the Night of the Living Dead remake), but my distaste for Dawn remains unchanged.
Films like this achieve a kind of dark grandeur-- it's not easy to make movies this bad, but somehow Romero pulls it off again and again (something must have happened to him right after he made the great original Night of the Living Dead).
If the characters are going to casually, and easily, dispose of the zombies then I am not as hell sure going to feel scared whenever I see one.The make up & gore effects in this film is quite simply a joke.
The film stars Ken Foree, who went on to do more great things, but Romero alumnus John Amplas shows up (as well as his job as casting director and makeup assistant), and the DP is Michael Gornick, who went on to do directing of his own.Tom Savini tells us that a "drunken zombie stole a golf cart, drove it around the mall and crashed into a pillar".
This makes that point reasonably well but I actually preferred it in Shaun (but I know it could be because this is an older film).The horror of this film comes from the gore as the zombies are far too slow and easily avoided to be really truly scary.
It's a shame, because I usually don't like remakes but I do have to say that the remake is a lot scarier and Shaun of the Dead is a lot funnier and makes the same sort of comments on society.Overall this is still a good movie that uses the horror genre to make comments about a commercialist society that is (literally) eating itself with the pursuit of stuff for stuff's sake.
When first released George A Romeros' Dawn of the Dead was one of the most graphic and brutal films of all time.
This safety comes in the form of a mall in which they set up base.The four of them have plenty of run-ins with zombies and other survivors alike, which fill up this two-hour long movie with plenty of fun and exciting moments.Overall Dawn of the Dead is the greatest zombie, and possibly horror film, of all time.
When Pittsburgh-based auteur George Romero teamed up with Italian giallo genius Dario Argento to bring us the sequel to the seminal drive-in favourite 'Night of the Living Dead', a genre-defining classic was created which was to influence horror-movie makers for decades to come.
'Dawn of the Dead' is a deservedly revered masterpiece which intelligently mixes social commentary with nerve-jangling terror, black humour and buckets of gore; not many film-makers manage to do that!Since the first movie, the phenomenon that caused the dead to rise has continued unabated and zombies now threaten to outnumber the living.
At this point the blood really hits the fan and we are introduced to Tom Savini's inventive comic-book gore which is very gruesome and brilliantly shocking, with exploding heads, limb chewing and gut-munching aplenty.Two members of the SWAT-team decide that the time has come to head for safer ground, and together with a helicopter pilot and his pregnant girlfriend, they set off to find somewhere free of shuffling reanimated corpses.They eventually land their chopper on the roof of a huge mall to search for supplies, but soon realise that it might make sense to make the shopping centre home for a while, until they have a chance to make better plans.
It is in this setting that Romero makes his sly comments on consumerism (comparing shoppers to zombies) and the materialistic mentality of the average person.But all good things come to an end, and disaster eventually arrives in the form of an army of bikers who break down the mall doors, intent on laying their hands on some of the goodies within.
Romero first shocked moviegoers back in 1968, it was with "Night of the Living Dead", a dark, brutal zombie film saturated with atmospheric black and white cinematography and unflinching gore, which was quite unheard of at the time.So audiences may have been somewhat surprised when they saw Romero's follow-up, "Dawn of the Dead" in 1978.
This was an important place in their lives." Is there even any doubt as to what Romero was trying to say?But don't worry, horror fans, for while Romero was layering in all his clever little metaphors and commentaries, he didn't forget the one important little element that makes "Dawn of the Dead" so infamous: gore.
Whilst I love and admire the truly nihilistic ending to Night of the Living Dead (surely the bleakest ending to a film since Clouzot's Wages of Fear) Romero does right by his heroes and gives them an escape, a chance to run and try and stay alive some more.
However, they realise this paradise in a post-apocalyptic world has much more of a burden on them than they think.Dawn of the Dead has to be one of the most loved zombie films of all time and for good reason.
By today's standards, the film is hardly shocking at all, but Romero's up close and personal look at a nihilistic world simply crawling with the undead is the kind of movie that makes horror lovers stand up and cheer.
The blood, I might also mention, doesn't even look like blood - unless red corpuscles changed to orange corpuscles without anyone telling me.In the end, it comes down to this: Dawn of the Dead is one of the best zombie films ever made - more than that, it's one of the best horror films ever made.
The first time I saw it (I was 17), I could only think how cool it was and what a fantastic time I had seeing it with several of my best friends...Watching it again and again through the years, I began to notice the great camera work in spite of the low budget, the GREAT work of all the Zombie extras, and I think, the ultimate message (also in its great predecessor, NIGHT of the Living Dead) that humanity is on a course for disaster that we may not be able to control.
The movie not only works as a blood and guts horror film but it also works perfectly as a drama because Romero's screenplay gives us plenty of time to get to know the four characters and feel for them.
Gornick and Romero have chosen to the camera to have shots to be very set in place or have minimal movements as this adds to the frightening feeling of the zombies coming closer and keeps the audience feeling helpless in looking away from the gore and horror, which is a decision I admire a lot.Dario Argento and The Goblins are credited as the composers for this film and they did a pretty good job here.
Ken Foree was good playing as the badass protector but at the same time he does show hints of vulnerability that makes the character feel human and not just another killing machine like the zombies.
Foree and Emge showed a much better performance in their physical acting making the stressful scenes feel believable.Dawn of the Dead may be heralded as an instant classic for some and it's flaws that I see maybe seen as a great aspect of the film but it just didn't work with me..
With Dawn of the Dead, George Romero proves that you don't need to create a high budget, CGI movie that tries way too hard to scare an audience, when what really scares someone is a feeling of hopelessness without a way out.
George Romero began the modern zombie movie craze in 1968 with the black and white classic, Night of the Living Dead, made for a reported $100,000.
He followed up ten years later with Dawn of the Dead and $500,000, which allowed him better sets; mostly a shopping mall in Pittsburgh, and color film for all the blood and gore.
If you don't like horror films, or zombie movies, or anything to do with the apocalypse then you probably wont enjoy this piece too much, this ones for fans of the genre.-After watching this one watch "Day of the Dead" an amazing sequel (with none of the same characters unfortunately) and the OK final zombie film from Romero in the series so far "Land of the Dead"9/10 because it seems to be somewhat of a cult film and I think a 10 should appeal to all audiences.
"Dawn Of The Dead" is an acknowledged high watermark of late 70's horror movies in general and of zombie cinema in particular.
Dawn of the Dead is the first zombie movie I have seen and i thought it was very good.
It is what some people will call .."a thinking man's horror film."While Dawn of the Dead is not without its flaws, the shere determination and storyline overcomes the mistakes and makes way for one of the best experiences one could have in front of a television set.
I shudder to think what the zombies in The Night of the Living Dead would have looked like had the film been done in color, but they were effective largely because of their relentless, monotonous advance and because their make-up was so simple.
People are so used to going to the mall that they even flock there after they have been attacked by the walking dead and reduced to nothing more than walking zombies operating only on the primal instincts to feed and, apparently, shop.This movie is more a curiosity piece than anything else by now, since horror films have evolved so much (and, like humans, not necessarily all in good ways) and also because the movie has been remade into such a vastly superior modernization.
"Night of the Living Dead" (1968) is truly one of the best horror films of all time, but it is quite adequately directed - the movie succeeds on its own, not because of its director.
All the other zombies can't have such close attention paid towards them by Savini, so they often appear as if they've wandered out of a pool of gray paint.Many people consider "Dawn of the Dead" to be one of the finest horror films of all time.
Dawn of the Dead may in fact be the greatest horror sequel of all time even though it really doesn't feel like one.
There is just something enthralling about the Romero zombie movies, even the ones that were part of the original trilogy: "Night of the Living Dead", "Dawn of the Dead" and "Day of the Dead".
After a rather tedious majority of the film, this is when "Dawn of the Dead" becomes a classic for more than just turning a shopping mall into an iconic image of horror cinema.
For me Dawn Of The Dead is so much more than just a zombie movie.
Dawn of the dead will go down as one of the best horror movies ever.