While Hollywood is loudly blaring the latest news on the Pirates of the Caribbean franchise (Johnny Depp to reprise role, name of film to be On Stranger Tides) word on the street is George A Romero’s new zombie movie, Survival of the Dead, sucks.
This is a pity because Dawn of the Dead was just so cool, but it confirms what all lovers of zombie movies suspected, that Romero’s undead plot lines are getting steadily worse. Since his landmark, Night of the Living Dead in 1968, gory walking corpse movie king Romero has directed six films in his zombie series.
Survival of the Dead sees some inexplicably Irish dudes on an island off the coast of the USA doing battle with more zombies while engaging in a family feud.
This is the trailer:
Vodpod videos no longer available.
The Guardian has reported mixed reviews of the film, asking,
“Could it be that George A Romero’s undying cycle of zombie movies is at last heading for the cemetery?”
Hollywood Reporter was quite keen,
“George A. Romero’s latest zombie fest, “Survival of the Dead,” is a polished, fast-moving, entertaining picture whose mainstream success will depend on audiences’ tolerance of its tendency to become an abattoir of extreme carnage.”
However Variety says,
“The script’s shallowness would be more forgivable if the direction weren’t so inert, the mayhem so off-the-rack, and the whole thing so lacking in, well, scares. This is easily the least frightening of all the Dead movies.”
But is it all about the scares? How about the comedy hey? What about that? I must admit the trailer left me underwhelmed. Where were the wisecracks?
Personally I think this film looks much better:
Vodpod videos no longer available.
In other news, the Pirates of the Caribbean parrot has assaulted a police officer. How funny is that?
Eleri Mai Harris 
He hasn’t done anything good since Day of the Dead….Romero is no longer the king, or hasn’t been since the 80’s. He’s just lame now 😦
When Romero resurrected the Dead franchise (ha!) with Land of the Dead in 2005, it wasn’t for the sake of nostalgia: it was social commentary via brains and blood, and it worked pretty damn well. But Diary of the Dead annoyed me. I shouldn’t really complain about inability to suspend disbelief in a zombie film, but somehow it was easier to buy into the essential conceit of protagonists dragging a video camera around in, say, Cloverfield, as opposed to Diary. The entire mechanism felt perfunctory – and I am not filled with much hope for Survival of the Dead, which, let’s face it, is also an atrocious title.
On Stranger Tides is an excellent book – Tim Powers is an amazing writer, The Anubis Gates is one of my all-time favourites – and ripe for plot pillaging and adaptation into the further tales of Jack Sparrow. But with reference to your previous posts, zombies and pirates are as much in fashion as comic book adaptations, now that the Gladiator/LOTR-inspired swords-and-sandals-and-sorcery fetish seems to be dying down a little. Unless I am very much mistaken, there is a film adaptation of World War Z in the works, and Robert Kirkman better be bloody careful about selling the rights to The Walking Dead, because as a graphic novel it’s quite brilliant. Good post, and well done on keeping your theme going for this long!
Hi Eleri,
The new blog is looking good – well done. Remember that I need some media analysis from you. It isn’t enough to just list what media organisations are saying. You might get away with this because it’s about films but please in future try to show some engagement with media.
Your post has just re-kindled my love for George A Romero…..