Day Of The Dead (2008)

In the early 1990's Night Of The Living Dead became the first of George A. Romero's "Dead" movies to get a remake. In 2004 Dawn Of The Dead was remade by Zach Synder and really pumped life into the series, and now Tom Miner takes a crack at the third of Romero's movie; with drastically different results.


Day Of The Dead is the most dramatically different of the remakes, although it follows vaguely similar lines it could in fact be a completely different movie to the original. In 1985's Day Of The Dead the story was set in a bunker with a series of ragtag military types trying to fight an army of Zombies that used to be the human race. The 2008 offering starts with the story afresh as do all the remakes, explaining the story from the offset (Romero's all followed on from each other). Setting the story in a small mountain town, with a military base; as the movie begins the town is in lockdown having had a strange virus sweeping through the town. As the military controls the situation, it allows Sarah (Mena Suvari)a senior ranking officer the opportunity to slip away to tend to personal matters, namely the sudden illness of her mother. In doing so she finds herself in the local hospital with her mother, brother and his girlfriend in toe. It's here that things go from being a simple virus, to a deadly infection as those infected lose control and lash out at those that are "normal", the quest to eat human flesh being unquenchable.


While still achieving the military connections of the original, Day Of The Dead only pursues the bunker aspect of the movie in the last 20 minutes, instead opting to follow the events of a zombie take over in a small town. Part of the tedium of the original in my mind was that it became very insular very quickly, where as this version continuously moves from location to location, beginning at a checkpoint, moving onto a hospital, radio station, car park, and finally the military bunker.


This version of Day Of The Dead sadly still is not a good movie, despite its continual moving and an abundance of action scenes. Having enjoyed the big budget feel of Dawn Of The Dead's 2004 remake this movie goes much lower down the budget constraints, opting to utilise darkness to cover up the flaws of the special effects. The story is kind of flawed too; although it's consistent there were several points that I found myself almost nodding off, even during the heart of the action.


The movie avoids using Romero's slow moving zombies, none of that slow staggering around here; these creatures move incredibly fast, and are possibly the most human depiction of zombies ever seen on the screen, with advanced intelligence as well as swift movements. When the hero's climb overhead through the air conditioning, our zombies thing to get a broom and bash the panels away allowing easier access.


Something else that Steve Miner's zombies get involved in is self devourment, thinking nothing of ripping off their own flesh should their pursued prey manages to get away. One of the first to make to journey from human to zombie snacks on his own eyeball to tide him over while he chases after Sarah.


Mena Suvari who most will remember from the first American Pie movie makes an impressive return to the screen after several years working on smaller projects (most of which being on TV). From her comedy roots she becomes an unexpected action hero or rather her character Sarah does, leading the movie in a combination of smart thinking and action sequences many actresses would love to get their teeth into.


Doc Martin's Ian McNeice appears as the radio station DJ who takes in humans from the outside, but for uncertain purposes. While Ving Rhames who took a large role in Dawn Of The Dead (2004) takes a minor role here as the military's top man.


While I'm less than impressed with this remake I believe it's on a par with the original, which as I explained earlier I was less impressed with too. A little more time, care, attention, and money could have made this movie a lot better than it was and after Dawn Of The Dead this seems rather substandard in comparison, though it will obviously get many of Dawn's viewers expecting to see similar high quality translation. In fairness as soon as I saw the logo First Look appear at the movies opening I realised that the movie was going to be a bit of a failure, First Look seemingly investing in movies on the basis that they have older acclaimed actors, continuing chapters, or movie projects that fell down after being half completed. Day Of The Dead could literally have been a half completed project, because its ending is strangely rushed after a reasonably slow build up; almost seeming like a different movie.