Land of the Dead Year: 2005 Director: George A. Romero Written by: George A. Romero Threat: Zombies Weapon of Choice: Harpoon Gun IMDb page:

Other movies in this series:
Night of the Living Dead
Dawn of the Dead
Day of the Dead

Rish's Reviews
Well, here it is, all these years later. Both zombies and George A. Romero have certainly had a lot of positive exposure lately. It's strange the level of respect the man has garnered, having only ever made two hit films (and one he never gets royalties for), and it certainly says something that my ticket was for "George A. Romero's Land of the Dead."
So, the world has gone to hell in a handbasket since the dead started returning to life. Once content to barracade ourselves inside houses, shopping malls, and military bases, the survivors now have an entire community to themselves, walled up and protected with searchlights, electric fences, a river, and a highly-armoured vehicle named Dead Reckoning. In service of a man (Dennis Hopper) living in luxury at the top of a highrise building with all the amenities, our heroes (Simon Baker and John Leguizamo) lead a team of raiders who travel to nearby communities to get supplies. Of course, the living dead are everywhere, looking not only for food, but for a semblance of the life they used to lead. When both our heroes make enemies within the enclosure, the characters find themselves split into two groups: those threatening the community, and those trying to stop them. Oh, and of course, the dead.
The film begins with a simply wonderful introduction to the world of the zombies, where we see how they've been living their . . . well, lives, since we last caught up with them. These creatures are fascinating, and much scarier than I remember them being before. It may be, though, that since this is the first of Romero's flicks I've seen in the theatre, everything just seemed more frightening and intense to me.
Much has been said about how no one can make zombie films like Romero, and yeah, I have to agree with them. Still, it was kind of a shock to realise what kind of zombie films Romero did make, way back in the day (and before).
While not cast with stars, this did showcase a few familiar faces. This Simon Baker guy is really alright. I normally hate Leguizamo, but they try to give him a sort of honor-among-thieves personality. Asia Argento was close to pretty, and seems kind of vulnerable in a moment or two, almost as if her whole facade is merely that. I really dug the guy with the burned face, only because he was genuinely sympathetic, with an interesting voice and backstory. Dennis Hopper was the villain here, the cigar smoking, double-crossing, nice suit-wearing, racist, greedy bastard. I don't know how good he was in the role, but I sort of appreciated the character. Tom Savini had a short, pointless cameo, though I clapped along with everyone else.
A lot of care has been taken to make all the zombies personable and unique, which Romero has done from the very beginning. Still, when my friend saw a clown zombie, he remarked that it was really sick, even for G.A.R.. The main zombie (I almost said "head zombie," but chose not to--that was clearly a different one), who some call "Big Daddy," sort of annoyed me because he acted so non-zombie-like, but I suppose that was the point. In each one of these living dead films, Romero has shown us the undead becoming more human (from mindless savages in Night to somewhat human-like in Dawn to sadly humanistic in Day). This is just one more step in that evolution.
I guess it's safe to say that the humans in each living dead film get a step closer to being monsters, doesn't it? Oh, and as testaments to why we truly deserve to become extinct, there was one idiotic kid put on lookout duty, with about a hundred million zombies wandering around, so the first chance he gets, he puts down his gun and puts on his headphones.
What did they say to Jamie Lee Curtis again?
It is quite gory--though not quite on par with Day of the Dead, I'd say. It may be that they had to trim some stuff to get an R rating (which reminds me, this is the first R-rated entry in Romero's series). Still, there were some really amazing death scenes, and a couple of truly disgusting moments. I really dug a 90% decapitated zombie who flipped its head back and forward like a Bic lighter or Pez dispenser.
It ended a bit abruptly for my tastes, and had the same situation-left-unresolved ending as Dawn and, to a lesser extent, Day. I wanted it to go just a little longer because I was honestly starting to like a couple of the characters. That sounds like high praise, I know ("always leave 'em wanting more"), but it really isn't. Almost liking characters in a movie is the same as almost winning a fist fight or almost not peeing your pants in front of Jessica Alba.
The guy I saw it with seemed to like it less than I did, but I was really surprised he wanted to see it at all, since splatter films aren't his forte. I was glad to have gone with him, though. Otherwise, it would've just been me, Tyler Durden, and Norma Bates. As usual.
Well, the film was not a classic, but it was good, and there was some real talent involved, as well as some interesting social commentary (doesn't it say something that the woman with the navel ring has it torn out of her by a voracious zombie only to have the creature spit it out? Or that a character utters a racial slur, then is killed by two undead minorities? Or that a couple of chicks are lezzing out and are torn to bits in the act?). And it showed that even with all the ripoffs (Return of the Living Dead 4 and 5 are coming out this year), remakes (besides Dawn, somebody just bought the rights to redo Day), and homages (man, I love Shaun of the Dead), there's still stories to be told in this universe. Hopefully more good ones than bad.
Best Scare: This had a lot of scares--mostly from zombies lurching out or appearing where you didn't think they were.
I'd Recommend It To: Romero, zombie, and gore fans. In any order.
Posted: July 18, 2005

The tyranist's thoughts
While I didn't enjoy this one nearly as much as Romero's earlier Zombie flicks, I really wish I'd made the effort to see it in the theatre. As it was, the DVD I rented was messed up enough that I missed short bits of the movie here and there. If it had been a better movie, I would have re-rented it, but I think I'll be okay without doing that.
I really like the premise and the idea of human outposts amid the zombie ruins. It makes sense, perhaps more sense than the isolation of the previous films. I also like that in the end the zombies are a lesser evil than some of the humans.
There are some really great moments here. They are surprising when the occur like stumbling onto that really rare James Herbert novel in the used bookstore when all you've been seeing are romance novels. The cast is good and the script decent. I think that in the end the thing that drags this down is simply that it felt rushed. Like they were either stretching a too short script or a too tight budget and all the character development just didn't fit in.
As zombie flicks go, it was still better than most, but what do you expect from the master. Still the recent British zombie flicks have it easily beat. If you're a Romero fan, though, you really owe it to yourself to check it out.
Posted: May 18, 2006

Total Skulls: 18

Sequel
Sequel setup
Rips off earlier film
Horror film showing on TV/in theater in movie
Future celebrity appears
Former celebrity appears
Bad title
Bad premise
Bad acting
Bad dialogue
Bad execution
MTV Editing
OTS
Girl unnecessarily gets naked
Wanton sex
Death associated with sex
Unfulfilled promise of nudity
Characters forget about threat
Secluded location
Power is cut
Phone lines are cut
Someone investigates a strange noise
Someone runs up stairs instead of going out front door
Camera is the killer
Victims cower in front of a window/door
Victim locks self in with killer
Victim running from killer inexplicably falls
Toilet stall scene
Shower/bath scene
Car stalls or won't start
Cat jumps out
Fake scare
Laughable scare
Stupid discovery of corpse
Dream sequence
Hallucination/Vision
No one believes only witness
Crazy, drunk, old man knows the truth
Warning goes unheeded
Music detracts from scene
Death in first five minutes
x years before/later
Flashback sequence
Dark and stormy night
Killer doesn't stay dead
Killer wears a mask
Killer is in closet
Killer is in car with victim
Villain is more sympathetic than heroes
Unscary villain/monster
Beheading
Blood fountain
Blood spatters - camera, wall, etc.
Poor death effect
Excessive gore
No one dies at all
Virgin survives
Geek/Nerd survives
Little kid lamely survives
Dog/Pet miraculously survives
Unresolved subplots
"It was all a dream" ending
Unbelievably happy ending
Unbelievably crappy ending
What the hell?