Review of Survival of the Dead (2010) by Parker M — 13 Aug 2010

3 Stars out of 5.

If someone could pull of an intelligent zombie flick, it would be George A. Romero. His reincarnation of the dead began in 1968 with Night of the Living Dead which had a strong voice on racial degradation. A good film. His newest film, Survival of the Dead, surprisingly competent as well. Like all Romero's films, it doesn't go without its flaws but Romero's film has a brain with a different taste despite the flesh having the same succulency.

Romero, as always and smartly, distances the zombies from the focus of the plot. Typically, the plot features a clash between the humans and how it's not just the deadheads (which they are now called) that are after them. We go from Fiddler's Green (the technologically refigured Toronto) to video camera to island. The location is strikingly trite but the plot takes further steps. Crocket (seen from other Romero films, played by Alan Van Sprang) is leading a bunch of soldiers to an off coast island, for a hope of salvation. They get far from that. They encounter a nasty shootout, resulting in the absurdly random relationship between Crocket and James O'Flynn (played with Malcolm McDowell authority by Julian Richings). They soon discover that the island is full of deadheads chained to poles but attempting to go about daily activities (delivering mail, chopping wood, and even riding a horse). The zombies seem to be advancing and so do Romero's ideas. His zombie platter is starting to get richer.

Romero's flesh-eating flicks are all about exploring clichés, not just using them. His Darwinistic approach to zombies may come off trite but I find it to be unique, an addition to a film that practically begs for originality. Before the film begins, we already get the picture. There are zombies. There are humans. The humans are fending off the zombies. These sentences alone sound stale. Romero, realizing his premise is already a setting sun, strives for new light, rich-unique characters, and even a humanization of zombies themselves.

The latter of these attempts are contrived. Seeing a female zombie ride a'horseback is just laughable, but Romero continues to move the story forward. He classifies humans as these believers and non-believers sort: believers that we can get the zombies to eat something other than human. But the familiar conflicting charade goes further. Romero westernizes Survival into a cowboy satire (something The Book of Eli attempted and failed). His John Wayne-esque approach comes off as a fresh experiment, another dimension to these already caricatured anti-hero survivors.

The emotion is devoid here and for the better. Land of the Dead was inundated with emotion to reinforce the poignancy of class struggle. Here, Survival explores technological nuances--better weaponry, iPODs, etc. (I wonder if I could get a zombie to appreciate the Rolling Stones again?).

Somehow Romero makes this film work. Despite the excruciatingly tiring opening to this film, Romero continues to surprise us. The cheesy one-liners are aplenty, the flat performances are more or less profuse, but the cliché shenanigans are wittingly self-aware. After a while, it's like these people know they're in a zombie movie and since we know most of them will sooner or later are going to get their faces bitten off, Romero spares the sentiment and boosts the hilarity.

Survival, like so many of Romero's great films (Dawn of the Dead, Diary of the Dead, Night of the Living Dead) ends on a bad note. The infantile second-hand protagonist narrates a matter-of-fact recount on the story. Romero's satire becomes ridiculously sombre--a facetious experiment with undertones on the Iraq War. Why go sombre when the laughs had just rolled off my tongue?

Nevertheless, Survival of the Dead is worth the watch for the eccentric kills, the smart narrative, and the three-dimensionality of the usually under-developed flesh eaters. When we thought we couldn't take one more zombie movie, Romero surprised us. With a little smarts and a satirically original genre, the flesh may be worth another bite.

I SAY-See It, a nice surprise.