Are you prepared for a zombie apocalypse? How do you fancy your chances? Would you, in fact, secretly savour the soap-operatic potential in being one of a small gang of survivors in a defamiliarised landscape, as explored by The Walking Dead? Do you think of zombie walks as the new psychogeography?
At the intersection of voodoo-magic and science, sci-fi and horror, the zombie subgenre restlessly stirs. On the one hand, we have a line descending from the proverbial Mad Doctor busying himself with reanimating corpses or restoring life to body-parts – from Frankenstein to Herbert West (Re-Animator).
On the other, we find the archetypal Mad Voodoo Master, Svengali-like and hell-bent on power – Bela Lugosi in White Zombie. Other notable films in the voodoo-zombie category include I Walked with a Zombie and Plague of the Zombies.
Early variants on the zombie include sleepwalking Cesare – The Cabinet of Dr Caligari brings together magic and science, with Caligari appearing both as magician in a circus, and in the guise of doctor at the head of an asylum.
Then came the Romero zombies – the purist’s ‘Zombie’. Romero’s zombies combine another two strands in horror – the flesh-eating ghoul, and the slow-shambling zombie (a phenomenon for which no explanation, scientific or magical, is offered in the films – departing from sci-fi convention).
The Romero zombie almost put paid to the voodoo-variety (though not entirely – one significant later addition to that subgenre came in 1988, with Wes Craven’s The Serpent and the Rainbow).
1968’s Night of the Living Dead, made independently on a shoestring budget, established the defining features of the new monster, and spawned the subgenre of zombie horror. Extraordinarily effective, Night was an instant classic.
Dawn of the Dead, a decade later, reinforced the conventions, gave a massive boost to Tom Savini’s career (Savini had already worked on zombie-makeup with Alan Ormsby, on the film Deathdream – of which, more later), and was adopted by the punk subculture for its sharp commentary on consumerism.
My favourite, Day of the Dead, followed in 1985 – relentlessly claustrophobic, the film focuses on a small group of survivors, tense, paranoid, and isolated – with a bold emphasis on long scenes held together by unforgettably quirky dialogue (“I’m running this monkey-farm now, Frankenstein”). Land of the Dead is entertaining, but less influential in the formation of a genre.
The Romero-zombie: slow-moving; inarticulate groans; one bullet through the head should do the trick. For many zombie-fans, these have crystallised into the marks of the ‘true’ zombie.
Yet, the zombie-demand “Brrrrains!” has become equally iconic; we have Return of the Living Dead to thank for that particular touch.
Return of the Living Dead’s zombies are strategy-devising zombies, and well-nigh invincible – with Romero’s zombies, when the brains were out, the zombie would die, and there an end – but in the 1980s (in both the Return and Re-Animator series), they rise again – with a variety of detached appendages and strange assemblages of body-parts providing the climax to Bride of Re-Animator.
Let’s take a closer look at the slow-moving zombie. This particular zombie-trait has its staunch defenders – and not without reason; it predates Romero, and is testimony to the continuing legacy of the voodoo zombie.
The Dawn of the Dead remake (2004) was damningly slated for ‘daring’ to diverge from this established characteristic. In this view, running zombies would seem to constitute a contradiction in terms.
However, there is a less well-known tradition of fast zombies, arising not long after Romero’s initial venture into zombiedom.
Some of those early 1970s’ zombies did not just run – they were faster even than that. Ossorio’s The Blind Dead ride forth on horses, while Psychomania features an undead motorcycle-gang.
Facebook quizzes on one’s chances, survival guides, internet sites devoted to playful speculation on the probability of a zombie apocalypse… So, is realism at all possible in the zombie-subgenre?
A few recent films have attempted a ‘realist’ approach – Colin, a zombie’s perspective; and Romero’s Diary of the Dead.
Zombies have, curiously, earned a place among the most lovable of monsters. From the zombie pet in Pet Sematary, to the pet zombies in Day of the Dead (Bub), Billy Connolly as Fido, and Nick Frost at the end of Shaun of the Dead, zombies have captured our hearts.
And though the seductiveness of the vampiric undead seems ill-suited to zombie films, it’s not entirely lacking – consider, for example, the necrophilic ‘Romeo and Juliet’-style romance, Return of the Living Dead 3.
A few other zombie films:
Children Shouldn’t Play with Dead Things (1973) – one of those ‘so-bad-it’s-good’ movies, with delightful schlock-effects. The first part of the movie plays out like a Kenneth Anger-parody. It keeps getting sillier.
Messiah of Evil/Dead People (1973) – an unusual and obscure little gem.
Deathdream (1974) – this is a more thoughtful film from the makers of Children Shouldn’t Play with Dead Things (Bob Clark and Alan Ormsby). Ormsby and Tom Savini join forces, forming one of the most influential, formidable zombie-makeup teams in the history of horror. A Vietnam vet returns home – alienated from his family, disconnected from society, and dead.
Living Dead at the Manchester Morgue (1974) – If you like zombie films, this is essential.
Zombie Flesh Eaters (1979) – although the debt to Romero is clear, Lucio Fulci’s zombies are distinctive: rising from the ground, rotting and maggot-ridden. The zombie vs. shark scene has gone down in cult-film history. Also: The Beyond, House By the Cemetery, City of the Dead.
The Evil Dead Trilogy – Bruce Campbell becomes legend.
Mutant/Night Shadows (1984) – Night Shadows provides a highly enjoyable example of the specifically-1980s wave of ‘toxic zombie’ films, if you can find it.
Braindead/Dead Alive (1992) – Peter Jackson’s foray into the genre – and what a glorious mix of explosive silliness and guts it is.
Undead (2003) – Entertainingly and unapologetically over-the-top.
Les Revenants (2004) – Not the flesh-eating kind, but an interesting atypical take on the genre.
[Rec] (2007) – May be a zombie movie. May be not. Watch it and decide.
An extended list might include other films that share some characteristics with zombie films – the outstanding Invasion of the Body Snatchers (both 1956 and 1978 versions)… L’Ultimo Uomo Della Terra… the singular Dead and Buried, and demon/possession movies that work on the same principle of infection, such as Demoni, as well as the ‘infectious cannibalism’ movies that owe a debt to the ghoul tradition as inflected through zombiefilms, for example, Cannibal Apocalypse. Not to mention rage-virus films 28 Days/Weeks Later among others.
And, lest we’re tempted to take the genre too seriously, here are some parodies: Flight of the Living Dead, Dance of the Dead, Dead and Breakfast, Zombieland, Zombie Strippers! and Black Sheep.