Review of Night of the Living Dead (1968) by Lexi W — 04 Dec 2015

Night of the Living Dread.

A horror movie on a low budget? George Romero did it, in his movie Night of the Living Dead. For the standards of 1968 it was probably magnificent, but for 2015's standards, not so much. I found myself wondering if anyone ever thought movie was actually scary; I myself found more humor than horror. Night of the Living Dead was the platform of many horror films after it's time. Thankfully, since then, there have been much better horror films created. I know there are a lot of Night of the Living Dead fans out there however I'm not viewing this movie as a "cult phenomenon". I'm looking for a good independant horror that I can sit down and enjoy.

First let's talk character: throughout the movie I wondered why Romero made Jonny and Cooper so annoying-when they got killed off I rejoiced. The fact that Romero killed off ALL of the main characters made me wonder: what good does that do for the movie? There is no hero in the end if everyone dies, and I was hoping that at least Ben would survive. What was Romero thinking? Its pretty sad that he had to kill every main character to inflict more horror into the audience.

I am going to be honest and say the makeup of the living dead was horrible. I wasn't sure if the living dead were supposed to look like zombies or like humans. The blood on the wall looked too staged; it's not hard to make blood splats that look realistic, even in the 60's. If you took the music and sound effects out of this movie it would reduce all of the scare factor. First off, music should only be there to add a little suspense; a movie should not depend on the music to create all sense of suspense. Low budget or not, how hard is it to sync the sound effects? Someone would throw a punch and then the sound effect would come in a minute after. I found this pretty humorous; it had me laughing at parts that were meant to be humorous.

The acting was overdramatized and quite annoying, especially coming from the women actors. If the living dead were to try to attack me I wouldn't just lay on the ground and scream hysterically. I'd get up and fight for my life. Barbra, did add a big creepy factor as she just sat on the couch staring blankly and quivering her lips without muttering a word. Tom, had no expression and hardly ever showed emotion, making his character look weak and brainless. However, I thought the romance of Tom and Judy added a tender factor to the movie. I actually felt a little sad when the truck the two were in was lit up in flames by the living dead.

Let's talk about the irony of the cellar. First when Cooper comes out of the cellar Ben ridicules him for his stupidity and they annoyingly fight about the safety of the cellar. However, in the end, who's hiding in the cellar? Ben. I found this quite hilarious; I bet Cooper was laughing from heaven as he watched Ben hide in the cellar. I see that Romero was showing Ben's desperation to stay alive by putting him in the cellar when in the first place he thought the cellar was the worst place to hide from the living dead.

The living dead are not explained as well as they could be. I don't know if Romero was trying to leave suspicion but it was very confusing. I was confused because I thought the living dead ate their victims. However, Barbra's brother who had been attacked by living dead somehow came back as one of the living dead. I think it would have added to the movie if they would have explained how the living dead came to be and why the living dead were afraid of fire instead of just having an irrational fear of it. I mean, yeah, fire is scary but if I were hungry, I'd try my hardest to get food even if I had to avoid flaming objects.

The Night of the Living Dead is an independent horror movie; the sets were nice, but the acting was unbearable. I wouldn't even call this a horror movie, I found no fear whatsoever in this film and I will only suggest it to people who, like I would, find humor in it's many flaws.