Night of the Living Dead (1968)

Tagline: They keep coming back in a bloodthirsty lust for HUMAN FLESH!

Curiosity: Go Keystone State! Also, zombies.

Plot: Siblings Barbara (Judith O’Dea) and Johnny (Russell Streiner) drive to a Pennsyltucky cemetery to visit their parents’ graves. There, they encounter a disheveled man who stumbles about as if drunk. Johnny teases the frightened Barbra about it, uttering the now-immortal line, “They’re coming to get you Barbara.” But when the stranger attacks Barbara, Johnny gets serious and tries to save her, getting bitten in the ensuing fight. A now pretty gosh dang freaked out Barbara flees, crashes her car, and stumbles into a farmhouse. As it turns out, the inhabitants are dead and partially eaten. More shambling beings descend on the house, and Barbara is saved only by the intervention of Ben (Duane Jones). It turns out these creatures are the living dead, or zombies. They feed on flesh, be it human or otherwise. And they can’t stopped, although destroying the brain seems to go well, and the creatures do show an aversion to fire. While Barbara goes catatonic, Ben rounds up more survivors and tries to figure out how to survive the night (…of the living dead?!).

Thoughts: Given how far Romero has come as a filmmaker, it’s hard to talk about Night of the Living Dead without backhanded compliments. It’s really good… for an indie movie. The plot is surprisingly fleshed out… for an indie movie. And the zombie special effects look nice… for what is essentially a home movie. To be clear, Romero made the movie on a budget $114,000. Most of the zombies are played by friends, family, and neighbors. Whenever the zombies eat people, they’re eating baked ham and chocolate sauce.

Another backhanded compliment is that the film’s appeal is somewhat coincidental. Romero shot in black and white for monetary reasons, but the decision lends his shots an extra layer of guerilla appeal, striking a similarity with all of the Vietnam War footage that was coming through in ’68, the year of the film’s release. And much has been made of the film’s hero Ben, who also happens to be black; another radical move for a ’60s flick, horror or otherwise. Romero himself said that Jones was given the part because he had the best audition; skin color had nothing to do with it. But that does lend the illusion of race relations to the movie.

Now, I’m proud to be from Pennsylvania, but let’s be honest – parts of the commonwealth’s middle “Pennsyltucky” portion are known for their racism. In-context as well as out, having a strong black role model is revolutionary. And while it never comes up in the dialogue, there’s a lingering thought that the Doubting Thomas of the survivors, Harry Cooper (Karl Hardman), is at least partially rebelling against Ben based on cultural stereotypes (which is to say nothing of the twist ending). Because of their inherent pulpliness, horror films are a great medium for socio-political criticisms, and Romero’s Dead films, for the most part, deliver these ideas without sermonizing too much, thanks to buckets upon buckets of fake blood. Somehow, the guy managed to make a movie about race relations without actually talking about race.

Reflection: While the series took a massive leap forward with Dawn of the Dead, I still recommend watching Romero’s zombie films chronologically. Night establishes the most basic tenets of zombie films. Plus, it’s public domain, so you can watch it for free right now.