February12
Regular supermaw readers will know that I am a lover of all things undead, so I am sure you won’t be surprised to find out I have put a little time and thought into my top ten zombie movies of all time.
I generally find it impossible to actually settle on favourites, so this definitive list would probably change from one week to the next depending on what I had most recently seen. Regardless of this, I have decided to put together a list, partly just to praise the movies I love, but also to give a good overview of the variety of zombie films available.
First things first, lets clear up why I love horror and specifically zombies so much. Well there are a bunch of reasons. Zombie movies were traditionally made on a low budget and maybe with lower expectations that other movies, which leads to some funny moments, but also moments of awesomeness you wouldn’t get in a more mainstream film. The fact that these movies were made by crazy people on crazy budgets is what makes them so brilliant. Sure you get some laugh out loud dips in quality, but you also get some truly gory, uncomfortable and just plain scary moments that you would be hard pushed to find anywhere else.
So why zombies? The classic zombie era spawned many other low budget horrors, but something about that sluggish yet inevitable approach of mindless terror obviously strikes a chord with many of us. Of course the fact that they were recently human helps. The thought that any one of us, or any of our friends or relatives could quite easily turn into one of the living dead is chilling. Chilling, yet strangely appealing.
Over the years zombies have evolved, some of them even run now, I kid you not. Due to their obvious longevity directors have been able to make zombie films on larger budgets, and sometimes they don’t totally suck. As the recent £45 zombie film Colin and the upcoming Invasion of the Not Quite Dead illustrate, as long as there are aspiring film makers out there we will be scared and entertained by zombies in a variety of styles and on a variety of budgets.
So without any further delay, here are my top 10 zombie films…
It would be unthinkable to leave Romero’s Night of the Living Dead out of any zombie movie list. It might not have been the first zombie movie, but it has been successful and popular enough to influence many of the great zombie apocalypse movies that followed, and many feel it has been a major influence on the whole zombie sub-genre. Set in rural Pennsylvania, this black and white film tells the story of a group of people trapped in a farmhouse while the zombie threat rages outside.
The film starts innocently enough, with a pair of siblings visiting their fathers grave, but they are soon attacked by a strange pale man. The brother is killed and his sister Barbara flees, seeking refuge in a farmhouse, surrounded by more of these strange men. She soon discovers a group of people hiding there, and together they attempt to secure the house and survive the night, while reports of mayhem and confusion outside continue on the radio.
Inevitably the group struggle to cope, and over the course of the movie more of them become infected and begin to attack and eat each other. As great as these scary and gory moments are, the real horror of this story (and many zombie films that follow) is the hopelessness of the situation as they struggle to survive against an unthinking and merciless foe.
A modern, Spanish take on the zombie movie. I have included this film as it shows how the basic idea of humans becoming somehow infected and attacking the healthy continues to evolve in totally new and unexpected ways. This film was shot in documentary style, and is entirely set in one dark and claustrophobic building. Somehow despite the unbelievable premise it manages to seem very real and very scary.
A group of people get quarantined in an apartment building after some of the residents come down with a very zombie like “illness”. A reporter and camera crew were following the local cops who are called in, and they all end up trapped with the residents, as they are quarantined by the authorities trying to avoid the spread of infection. Initially the reporter treats the situation as a story, and interviews the residents and policemen, building up a picture of what the mysterious infection might be, and how the situation has come about.
Fear and confusion quickly escalate, and members of the group are attacked and injured as they struggle to figure out what is happening and how to stay alive. There are some truly terrifying moments when the infected attack, and the shaky documentary style footage, along with the darkness and confinement certainly heighten this. I have yet to see the American remake Quarantine, however I see no reason to chose that over this great original, even if it is in foreign. Sub-titles are good for developing the brain, maybe.
For reasons unknown a bunch of aspiring actors follow their insane cock of a director to a weird island full of graves to dig up a dead body and you guessed it, play with it. Why director Alan has decided to drag what he calls his children to this island for this nonsense is never explained properly. How could you? After creeping them all out with stories, then pulling a prank with a corpse and the help of the campest fake zombies ever, Alan dons a really rubbish wizards robe and starts trying to raise the dead.
They then adjourn to the cottage with Orville, a corpse they have dug up, and Alan continues to upset the group with his mean spirited pranks, strange behaviour and apparent desire to bed a corpse. Eventually his bizarre spells from earlier actually work, the dead rise up and start biting people, and the group gets trapped in the creepy cottage, surrounded by surprisingly fast zombies.
This film was made on a really small budget, with friends of the director being roped in to help, however despite the low budget and bizarre attempt at a plot, the make-up and effects are surprisingly good. Just a shame the same can’t be said for all of the acting. As baffling as the plot and characters might be, this film is definitely worth watching, just don’t expect it to make any sense or deliver any likeable characters.
This movie may have been made in 2001, but the budget, acting and generally terrible quality of every aspect of this movie make it seem a lot older. Notable mainly for the momentary appearance of zombie movie legend Tom Savini as a zombie killer at the start of the movie, unfortunately the movie goes downhill from there. Way, way downhill. This movie ignores most of the established zombie movie rules, but it seems to be out of laziness than any desire to create something awesome.
The film centres around Abbot Hayes, a dead serial killer and rapist who disappears from the morgue and becomes the leader in a number of waves of zombie attacks. A group of local young people fall under his influence, which is explained by a flashback to him abducting them as children, earning him the nickname Abbot Hayes zombie babysitter in our house.
The Director, Tor Ramsey actually offered a written apology to anyone who “wasted 90 minutes of their life” watching this film. However, as far as I am concerned this movie is so bad it actually works it’s way back round to good. This film has it all, bad acting and every zombie movie cliché you can imagine (and a few that are pure nonsense). Don’t watch this film expecting a classic, or rough gem. It really is terrible, but if you share my sense if humour that won’t matter, as you will be laughing from begining to end.
Nobody does horror like the Italians and the Spanish, and who better to make a British based zombie romp. Okay so it has it’s share of cheesy moments, strange voice work and despite the title they don’t seem to go anywhere near Manchester. However despite, or maybe in addition to those quirks this film still manages a few moment of real zombie related horror. Plus it’s worth watching for misogynistic hero George alone.
The story follow George and Edna, who damages his bike and therefore agrees to take him to his destination. The pair soon become aware that the dead are rising, and become involved with the local police as they try to convince them of the danger. As the story unfolds we are treated to an awesome array of zombies, and one of the most frightening zombie attacks ever.
There are some flaws in this Spanish/Italian production, but this movie offer a great soundtrack, an engaging story, a great combination or gore and terror and plenty of characters that you will love to hate.
A modern British take on the zombie movie, 28 Days Later follows the struggles of a small group of survivors after a mass outbreak which causes the majority of the population to display typically zombie like symptoms. This 2002 Danny Boyle film seemed to distance itself from the zombie labels in the initial marketing, and till I saw the film I wasn’t sure it was really a zombie movie. However, when you watch the movie, despite differences in style (and zombie speed), the influences from classic apocalyptic zombie movies are unmissable.
Set in the UK, the film opens in a deserted London, 28 days after animal rights activists release a chimp infected with a virus called “Rage”. Bicycle courier Jim, awakens from a coma in a deserted hospital, and soon discovers the whole city is empty, with signs of disaster all round. He soon learns about the virus and meets up with other survivors who are struggling to stay alive.
As we follow them on their journey to find safety, we see them deal not only with threat from the infected, but also from other survivors. In the struggle to cope with the constant danger and total breakdown of society, the group are forced to make difficult decisions in a battle to stay alive.
Peter Jackson’s third movie is a comical gore fest, but with a $3 million budget he took the genre up to a new level and created some truly memorably gruesome scenes. Although it is in the same vein as his earlier works, the budget allowed him to create a far more polished end product, with effects that have to be seen to be believed.
The film opens on Skull Island, where a zombie creating monkey is captured and transported to New Zealand by a zoologist before the locals can prevent it. Fast forward to Wellington, and Vera, overbearing mother to Lionel becomes infected while spying on her sons date with local woman Paquita. Being a loyal son Lionel attempts to keep his mother sedated, while trying to maintain his romance. Unfortunately as the story unfolds, more of the town folk become infected and we are treated to a bewildering array of gore and vileness.
The obvious humour of this movie allowed Jackson to go far further with the gore factor than would normally be accepted, as most censors found it hard to believe that anyone would take it seriously. A great combination of horror and hilarity, I defy anyone to watch this film without laughing out loud.
Also known a Zombi, this 1978 film was the second film in Romero’s Living Dead trilogy, not linked by characters but by the basic premise of a zombie epidemic. While this basic premise is the same, in this story the outbreak has reached a much larger scale, and the film focuses on the effects on society of such an apocalyptic event. The outbreak has spread uncontrollably and there is little understanding of the causes, so despite the best effort of the government society has basically collapsed into mass hysteria and confusion.
Martial law has been imposed, and in the confusion the National Guard are attacking citizens and the infected alike. A group led by a TV station pilot plan a helicopter escape to the Canadian countryside, but unfortunately they are unable to make it there. They are forced to seek refuge in a shopping mall, which they feel able to secure against the increasing chaos outside. Once inside they are effectively trapped in this well stocked sanctuary, surrounded by danger, with constant reminders of the hopelessness of their situation. In addition to the zombie danger, they have to worry about their own risk of infection and the threat of attack by other more brutal survivors.
I really love this movie, everything from the claustrophobic shopping mall setting, to the awesomely quirky soundtrack, which perfectly compliments the the comedy of zombies on an escalator. The sheer hopelessness of this movie, and the constant risk of attack from every angle is what makes this movie so brilliant. Impossible to watch it and not start wondering what you would do and where you would go in that position.
Lucio Fulci’s film has it all. If You have any doubts let me just say this… it has an underwater fight between a zombie and a shark! Confusingly this 1979 movie has numerous names Zombie, Island of the Living Dead, Zombie Island, Zombie Flesh Eaters, Woodoo and of course Zombi 2, despite having no relation to Zombi (the Italian title of George A. Romero’s Dawn of the Dead).
The movie follows a young lady and a reporter who are searching for her father, whose boat was found mysteriously empty in New York harbour, after he leaves to do research on a tropical island. After being questioned by police, they discover a note from Anne’s father, advising them he is on the island of Matool and that he has come down with a strange disease. They decide to travel to the island, after enlisting another couples aid, and on arrival they quickly become aware that the whole island is infected with the walking dead.
The couple struggle to survive and escape the island once everyone else has been infected in the hope that the horror hasn’t spread to the rest of the world. As this story unfolds we are treated to some fantastically gruesome moments, including an unforgettably cringe inducing eye gouging scene, which contributed to the film’s video nasty reputation.
In recent years the words horror and comedy in conjunction have filled me with dread. However, as a fan of Edgar Wright & Simon Pegg who created the fantastic series Spaced, I was excited to see their take on the zombie movie, and I wasn’t disappointed. Unlike some spoof horror movies this film didn’t just go for cheap laughs and it was obvious that the creators are big zombie film fans themselves. While they do play on horror movie clichés and stereotypes, they do so intelligently enough to make this a really entertaining movie.
The story follows Shaun, an unsuccessful guy approaching middle age, in a dead end retail job. Due to his lack of ambition, his friendship with bad influence Ed and his poor choice of date venues, his unhappy girlfriend Liz breaks things off. After a drunken night of commiseration with Ed, Shaun decides to sort his life out and win Liz back, but before he can put his plan into action there is a zombie uprising.
The rest of the film follows Shaun and his increasing group of friends including Ed and Liz, struggling to get to safety and stay alive. This struggle includes plenty of laughs, some genuine scares, great zombies and of course the obligatory learning of lessons and building of relationships. On paper there is nothing hugely original about this film (apart from the knowing comedy maybe), but the skill with which it is made turns a funny movie with zombies into a brilliant, well-made and popular film.
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There are hundreds of great zombie movies, and there is no way I could include them all, so I have tried to pick a good variety, most of which will lead you to other awesome choices. Also check out my post on Brooker’s Dead Set, which wasn’t included only because it isn’t actually a film. If you watch all the movies listed above, you will have my personal guarantee that you will be 100% prepared for the inevitable zombie apocalypse. No need to thank me now, plenty of time for that when I am leader of the remaining humans.
Now it’s your turn. Tell us about your favourite zombie films and why you love them.
