Dawn of the Planet of the Apes vs. Dawn of the Dead

2 comments

2 comments

Badass! WWSeanConneryD? "Should I go with the apesh...or the zhombeesh?" I'll go with Romero and the zhombeesh.

I'm of the unpopular opinion that Dawn of the Dead (2004) > Dawn of the Planet of the Apes > Dawn of the Dead (1978).

Yup, that's pretty unpopular. I'd probably go '78 > '04 > Apes. The original Dawn is one of the quintessential zombie movies. Scratch that, it's one of the quintessential horror movies, and it's an absolute riot from beginning to end.

I'd go Apes > '04 > '78 but I like all of them a lot.

You see, I don't quite get the appeal of the original Dawn of the Dead. I don't think it has aged gracefully in the slightest; look at the subpar acting, look at the choppy editing, look at the outdated make-up, look at the oh-so-clever social commentary (which can be reduced to just a single sentence: "consumers are like zombies". The film does nothing else besides establishing this concept). There have been zombie films since then that have been WAY better at doing what Dawn did, like 28 Days Later. I'd even argue that the remake had better direction and a bigger sense of dread. In the original, one moment they're running through a croud of zombies like nothing is wrong, while in the next a single zombie sloooowly sneaks up on a character and somehow is able to kill him. I don't know; I don't find it funny, scary, or even that good for that matter. Some cool gory effects, two or three memorable lines, but that's it. It certainly has its place in history (without Romero, how would zombie films look today? Hell, what would zombies in pop culture look like?), but I don't really understand its reputation either.