Extras:
Audio Commentary, "Designing the Dead" featurette, conceptual
art, TV Spots, theatrical trailers.
Director:
Dan O'Bannon
Screenplay:
Dan O'Bannon
Cast:
Burt: Clu Gulager
Frank: James Karen
Ernie: Don Calfa
Freddy: Thom Mathews
Tina: Beverly Hartley
Chuck: John Philbin
Spider: Miguel A. Nunez Jr.
Trash: Linnea Quigley
I think I've adressed this before but the eighties had so many cult classics.
Movies that didn't do so well then and found a fan base over
the years. This movie did do some business actually and had developed a
fan base over the course of 18 years. One of the creators of the
original Night of the Living Dead had agreed with George Romero that
they could both use the Living Dead name in future projects. His name
was John Russo and he set out to make a straight forward sequel to Night
but decided it had already been done well in
Dawn of the Dead.
So what was the next logical approach: turn it into a comedy/horror flick
instead. So, in away this movie is really an unofficial sequel.
The story is pretty simple really. In this movie, Night of the Living
Dead was based on a true story but changed from the real thing. A gas
leaked into a morgue long ago and caused the bodies to reanimate. The
army rounded all the zombies up and placed them in containers. By some
mix up, the containers found their way to a medical warehouse. Two
workers there decide to investigate one of the containers when it rips
open and shoots the gas at them. The gas reanimates a corpse and they
have to burn it. They burn it in a crematorium and the smoke mixes with
the rain and so forth. The rain seeps into the graveyard and instant
zombies. A group of punks also happen to holding a party in the
graveyard (one has this really funny line, he's dressed in the typical
'80s punk outfit: "This ain't no fucking costume, this is a way of
life!") and are caught in the middle of it all.
The zombies in this only eat brains plus they run and talk too. I'm a
big fan of the old fashioned zombies, slow and dim-witted, like those in
Dawn of the Dead. I don't think they'd work well in this one and it does
give it a level of scare that the Dead films left out sometimes.
A pretty cool movie from the 80s. Of course, it does have it's flaws.
The script was supposed to be cheesy but some lines are just WAY TOO
cheesy. The two medical warehouse workers scream and groan as they turn
into zombies and it comes off as overdone. Just watch Frank as he
coughs, throws up, and screams. That's funny. But even these flaws
shouldn't keep you from enjoying this fun movie.
MGM continues to please DVD fans with good transfers, extras, and a
cheap price. Anyway, this is the best the movie has ever looked. Colors
are nicely rendered and the movie just doesn't look 18 years old.
However, grain is apparent sometimes, mostly in the graveyard. There are
a few scenes which feature the sky and such which are hampered by
scratches on the print. Just watch the one scene featuring smoke coming
out of the crematorium to see what I mean. But this is still a great
transfer and it's flaws are easily overlooked. Just be amazed at how
good it held up since 1984.
Only two tracks are included. An English 1.0 mono track and a Spanish
mono track. This is the original track but I woner if MGM could have
spruced it up to 5.1 or even 2.0 for that matter. It's not a bad track
though and you'll never have any problems with dialouge. Sometimes it
sounded tinny when actors screamed but it's not terrible.
Extras are pretty good for this release. An interesting commentary, a
featurette on the zombies, conceptual art, and trailers round it out.
Not bad considering the cheap price of the disc.
Overall, MGM has delivered another great DVD and for only $14.98 you
almost have to get it. A fun movie for horror buffs alike with just a
hint of comedy thrown in. Oh yeah, and the box glows in the dark too.
As of April 2009, Blu-rays and DVDs reviewed by the editor are watched on a Panasonic TH-37PX80B
37" Plasma TV with a Sony BDP-1500 Blu-ray player and played through a Yamaha DSP-AX820 amplifier.
PC games reviewed by the editor are on:
Since Jan 2011: Intel Quad Core Dell XPS 8100, i7 CPU 860 @ 2.80Ghz, 8Gb RAM, nVidia GeForce GTS 240, Windows 7
Since Nov 2005: Intel Pentium D 830 3.0Ghz, 1Gb RAM, 128Mb nVidia GeForce 6700XL, Windows XP
Since Aug 2003: Intel Pentium 4 2.66Ghz, 512Mb RAM, 128Mb GeForce4 MX440 graphics, Windows XP
Since May 2003: Intel Pentium 4 2.6Ghz, 512Mb RAM, 128Mb ATI Radeon 9600TX graphics, Windows XP
Since Jun 2002: Intel Pentium III 600Mhz, 384Mb RAM, Windows 98 SE, 64Mb ATI Radeon 8500LE
Since May 2000: Intel Pentium III 600Mhz, 384Mb RAM, Windows 98 SE, Voodoo 3 3000 AGP
