Review of Night of the Living Dead (1968) by Al M — 25 Apr 2011

Night of the Living Dead is by no means the first zombie film: White Zzombie, I Walked with a Zoombie, and Plague of the Zombies all precede Romero's classic. Night of the Living Dead is not even the first great zombie film: the Val Lewton produced, Jacques Tourneur directed I Walked with a Zombie represents an amazing zombie film twenty-five years before Romero's Night of the Living Dead.

But Romero's film remains the father of the modern zombie film. While White Zombie, I Walked with a Zombie, and Plague of the Zombies featured slave zombies from the Haitian voodoo mythology, Romero's Night of the Living Dead was the first film to feature masses of zombies that feasted on human flesh, the characteristics that came to define the modern zombie genre.

Although somewhat tame and silly by today's standards, Night of the Living Dead was one of the films that redefined horror cinema in the 1960s. But Night of the Living Dead does not just introduce the modern version of the zombie, it also uses the zombie apocalypse as a means of exploring socio-political themes.

While Romero claims that he chose a black actor for the lead role simply because he gave the best audition, the film nevertheless becomes a commentary on race relations and social unrest in the late 60s.

A powerful portrayal of the inability of the black and white races to work together and the social change that was literally beating at the door of conservative America, Night of the Living Dead remains a classic film not just for its early depiction of zombies but also because it is a critique of the social unrest occurring at the time.