CHALLENGE 4 - DAY OF THE DEAD (2008)

However, as a race we’ve just gone ahead and accepted carrots. If we can accept those, we can accept anything.

Oh hey guys! After a totally unintentional monster of a break from reviews (cheers life), I’m back and watching all the crap you’ve recommended for me. And by ‘crap’ I mean ‘totally awesome movies that I can’t believe YOU think are crap’. So, of the several overdue nominations, which one did I start with? Why, Day of the Dead (2008) of course!
 
Now, before I get into this, those of you who read my ‘Dead Snow 2’ review will have gathered that when it comes to zombies, I’m not exactly objective. To be honest, I love them. They’re the apple of my eye… the wind in my sails… the cheese in my toasty. Basically, I’m their bitch. Anyone who challenges me with ANY zombie film is on to a loser, because I’m too biased about this particular monster. And to those who think that’s ridiculous or unfair, I say sorry but f**k it. I never said my reviews would be objective. In fact, I believe the point of writing them in the first place is to force my total love of horror on to the rest of you.  So here goes….

 Adrian Shotbolt, you nominated this one for me in the comments section, so I hope I can change your mind about, what I consider to be, a charming homage to a Romero original. To be clear folks, we’re talking about the 2008 remake starring Mena Suvari, not the George A. Romero 1985 original. There may be some spoilers.
 
Let’s begin by pointing out the obvious; that this film isn’t so much a remake as a reimagining of the original work. The setting has mostly changed, themes differ greatly, and the characters are basically new. It’s a fast-paced modern update, complete with quick human-to-zombie transformations, sprinting zombies, fast action sequences, and even faster editing, which contributes a lot to the overall pacing of this feature. What we basically get is the new ‘modern’ zombie (they run, leap, climb, and in this case, think - they even work together to hunt!), crossed with a giant nod to the original.
 
Sarah (played by Mena Suvari – on a superficial, sexually objectifying level, that’s always a plus), bears resemblance to the Sarah (played by Lori Cardille) from the original. She’s a strong female lead, but Suvari’s small stature and military rank make her a little different to Cardille. Her strength and ability to lead comes out of her personal connection to the infected area because it’s her hometown, and her brother is involved in the chaos. She has something to lose, and her family ties add a little oomph to the level of responsibility she has to get everyone the f**k out of dodge.
 
There are several nods to the original (which I also love), but my favourite has to be the inclusion of the character ‘Bud’ (Stark Sands). The second you hear his name (if you know the original), it has to raise a smile, because this dude is clearly this update’s version of Bub (Sherman Howard). Like the character he’s based on, he’s a little cowardly (just a bit), a little nervous, well trained, and ultimately helps to save the day. When we first meet him, he tells Sarah he’s a vegetarian, which gave me a good old laugh out loud moment, since he later becomes a zombie that refuses to eat his human pals. This is explained – apparently the zombies retain part of their personalities. We can accept that, but according to pretty much every other zombie in the movie, most of them must have been psychos to start with, if we go by that explanation. *Shrugs*.
 
If we look at the technical aspects of this movie, it’s a triumph. For me, the editing stands out, particularly in those ‘danger’ scenes, where our team is facing those undead, bitey bastards. The quick cuts lend themselves to fight scenes in action films, adding a bit of extra excitement and tension.
 
The opening of the movie in particular, pays attention to the theme of nature, and the notion that essentially, nature is f**ked right in the dick by humanity. We start with trees that lead to a neglected building, where some frisky couples are getting their Marvin Gaye on. It’s a nice visual analogy for humans being where they don’t belong, and adding ugliness to an otherwise glorious location. Those opening shots are complimented with some atmospheric music that hints at the trouble to come, so though we see those leafy, peaceful greens, we know that some holyshit-type catastrophe is pending. This theme is visually repeated a few times, until we go full-circle and our team end up in an underground research facility where the source of the outbreak is explained. Basically, some foolish doctors create a biological weapon, and it goes awry. Man tries to f**k with nature, and nature has the last laugh, basically. It’s glorious.
 
Another plus to this movie is that the characters, mostly, aren’t complete idiots that are just bound to be zombified or ripped to shreds. They actually have brains and they use them to problem-solve and plan their moves. Take our power couple, Trevor and Nina, for example. At first, they’re presented as those frisky, roll-your-eyes-at-them, people, but they turn out to be pretty capable zombie-killing machines. When the radio DJ starts to turn zombie, Nina immediately goes for the kill. 

The dude hasn’t even got time to enjoy a moment of zombieness before she stabs his f**king head in. 
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They’re at the radio station in the first place because Trevor spots the DJ’s silhouette in the window and realises there’s a safe place to run. They’re not just useless teenagers running around screeching, they’re thinking ahead and kicking the shit out of the undead. Ooh, I rhymed. Yay for me.
 
I don’t want to say a lot more because I want you to go watch and enjoy this movie. But I have just a few more things to champion this film for, like even newer-er-er…..er zombies. I know people want to resist the change – a lot of you don’t like that these days, zombies run. Totally ballsed up brain cells and rigor mortis be damned! – Running is just a thing they do now. But let’s remember that before Romero’s Night of the Living Dead (1968), zombies weren’t even dead. They were living people that were controlled by voodoo and they mostly didn’t feast on the flesh of the living. We had over 30 years of zombie movies that were nothing to do with undead corpses before Romero became the God of inventing scary shit and gave us these wonderful grave-defying chompers. Once we’re all used to it, we’ll see the changes are good….
 
Sure, some of you might watch this and note, with a shake of the head, that the zombies in this movie seem to hunt in packs. They trick people into walking into traps to ambush them and everything. Like lions. Or street gangs. They’re conscious of what they’re doing, and a lot of you won’t like that either because it seems to go against the grain of what a zombie is. However, as a race we’ve just gone ahead and accepted carrots. If we can accept those, we can accept anything.
 
I was delighted that, finally, the word ‘zombie’ is actually used in this movie. As much as I adore the genre, even I’m fed up of characters screeching ‘what are they?!’, as if they come from an alternate reality where everything else in pop culture exists, but oh no, there’s never been a zombie film.
 
To wrap it up, yo, this reimagining salutes the original, whilst updating the action and characters, and contains a nice amount of gore and violence to satisfy your sadistic cravings. There’s the odd comedy moment, some scary do-or-die sequences, and a satisfactory amount of story and character development to keep you entertained. Overall, for a movie that is totes meant to be complete wank, I really rate this one. Go check it out, Wendy.
 
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KAYLEIGH MARIE EDWARDS