Zombies

Quote of the Day: "Just look at the face: it's vacant, with a hint of sadness. Like a drunk who's lost a bet."
-Shaun of the Dead

Tonight in Film Theory we watched the original Dawn of the Dead. Like any zombie movie, it was pretty ridiculous.

I've never been a huge fan of horror movies, with the exception of very few (The Exorcist comes to mind). I can't say I was all that impressed with this one, despite it's being regarded as somewhat of a classic.

In our next class, I know that my professor will explain to us something along the lines of the ways Dawn of the Dead illustrates those complex filmic concepts of time and space, of alternate realities, of the development of a fictional world and the similar development of a new lifestyle in the mall in the, and all that wonderful post-modernist stuff. Honestly, I don't even know what makes something "post-modern," but it's a term that gets bandied about a lot in class and I think it's important.

Anyway, I think I prefer Shaun of the Dead. It's a film that finds the humor in zombie films and totally feeds off of. Dawn of the Dead, I think, does this to an extent, but Shaun of the Dead can easily be labeled a comedy, while Dawn is more of an unintentional comedy.

On the box for the Shaun of the Dead DVD, the film's honest approach to it's subject matter is recognized and embraced: "The Smash Hit Romantic Comedy," it says, "With Zombies."