Survival of the Dead (2009)

[pedromonkey]

Madmax beyond the thunderdome is a great film, definately not in the same league as Road warrior butgreat none the less.

[wayfarer]

Originally Posted by pedromonkey

Madmax beyond the thunderdome is a great film, definately not in the same league as Road warrior butgreat none the less.

It's watchable. I actually like it but it was a bit kiddified after TRW. They did the PG-13 thing on it. Hopefully Fury Road will have a harder edge to it.

[pedromonkey]

Originally Posted by wayfarer

It's watchable. I actually like it but it was a bit kiddified after TRW. They did the PG-13 thing on it. Hopefully Fury Road will have a harder edge to it.

I hope so, but just look at what Miller's last film was...Happy Feet

[Gojirosan]

Originally Posted by pedromonkey

Madmax beyond the thunderdome is a great film, definately not in the same league as Road warrior butgreat none the less.

I thought it was great when I was 14. I loved it. But it doesn't stand up to repeated viewing - unlike both previous Mad Max efforts. Indeed, when introducing my (ex)gf to the Mad Max films , I didn't bother showing her the third one as I thought it would warp the good vibes from 1 & 2.

And I still think Survival Of The Dead is a decent, fun film!

[wayfarer]

Originally Posted by pedromonkey

I hope so, but just look at what Miller's last film was...Happy Feet

Exactly. It doesn't bode well, but I'll keep an open mind.

[gorehound-09]

Originally Posted by Gojirosan

I thought it was great when I was 14. I loved it. But it doesn't stand up to repeated viewing - unlike both previous Mad Max efforts. Indeed, when introducing my (ex)gf to the Mad Max films , I didn't bother showing her the third one as I thought it would warp the good vibes from 1 & 2.

And I still think Survival Of The Dead is a decent, fun film!

I think Mad max 1 is fantastic i thought the sequel while fun and action packed wasnt as good and i couldnt even finish watching three I really am looking forward to the fourth installment as Tom Hardy and Charlize theron will bring so much acting weight to this tired franchise and now the technology is available hopefully the aussies will be back with their post apocalypse epics which i have sorely missed.

And Gojirosan thank you for sticking up for survival of the dead, LOOK I know George wont be as good as the trilogy they are inpentrable and while I love Land of the dead afetr hearing the problems with the studio etc I cant help feeling its not a true Romero film and I gladly look forward to his next installment of the film series and hope he continues to make them. Final note I loved the dock sequence it was like watching a live action cartoon and showed that while he is still trying to say something about the world he is now having fun with it like terry gilliam and Imaginarium of Dr Parnassus:rockon :

[Sam@Cult Labs]

Haven't got time to read through every post today but I watched SOTD the other day and I think it's the best Zombie film he's done since Day of the Dead hands down.

Land of the Dead and Diary of the Dead were both pretty terrible, although Land was watchable. Neither had a ounce of originality and it's always a mistake to let an aging director to make an Internet savvy movie.

Survival on the other hand had a great story that riffed on the Wild West and also the same small town values that coloured Night of the Living Dead. The USA was founded by religious extremists, an irony seemingly lost on most, and Survival paints this in big letters. The warring Irish families are a good metaphor for the forces dividing the US. The film could almost be a pro-choice parable as well, if you replace the family trying to keep the zombies alive with far right pro-life campaigners.

That's the thing about Romero, he makes Zombies political, it's just with Diary he forgot that to play with those new fangled interwebs and in Land, basing an entire film around the concept of the gated community writ large didn't pan out across and entire movie.

Speaking of the wild west, there is always a sneaking chance that the setting and style appealed because I've been playing Red Dead Redemption for a month solid.

[vaultkeeper]

This movie was really a disapointment.

[Almar@Cult Labs]

Originally Posted by vaultkeeper

This movie was really a disapointment.

Fair enough but what's interesting is why you think that so do tell

[evilzombie20]

I sat down and watched this with the lowest of lowest expectations.

After the letdowns that are LAND OF THE DEAD and DIARY OF THE DEAD, I'm sure there's no one that's a fan of the genre can blame me for that being so.

With that being said, and with that understanding, I bought it on Blu Ray expecting a train wreck but instead, got something closer to a minor fender bender that could easily be forgiven, and walked away from.

Enough with the analogies, I liked it. It was better than I had anticipated and I actually would love to see what would happen if George is allowed to make the other two zombie films stemming off the DIARY universe. The one I find that I think would be the most interesting is with the gang of looters the characters in DIARY run into. The story about the girl from Texas who escapes in DIARY I'm not thrilled about, but wouldn't be opposed to checking out.

I would at LEAST like to find out what happens to the characters in DIARY, maybe not so much the annoying narrator, but the other two - the professor and the film student from NY; Tony. They were the most interesting characters to me in that film and it's a shame it's ended with them locking themselves in a room with no real solution. So I hope, eventually, we see what happens to them - you know that doesn't involve gory deaths since I always feel that's such a waste to sit through an entire film, with a cliff hanger ending like that, then showing them in the sequel; dead.

Feels like the writer, in this case writer/director, didn't know what to do with the character(s) - so they just kill them off, instead of incorporating them into the new film. It's lazy writing to me.

It's also a huge gripe because you just spent 90 minutes plus with these characters only to find they're going to be killed off in the next film in the first 15 minutes.

Anyways, that's my rant about that - I did like SURVIVAL OF THE DEAD though, sure it's not a perfect film by any means - but it was a lot more watchable than DIARY and a little more forgivable than LAND.

Only thing I wish George would stop doing is giving his characters "cool" lines, snappy quips, one liners, smug looks and smart ass comments aren't what George's characters have been about. Sure in some of his films they've been there, but they're not all over the place like they've been in the last three films.