Survival of the Dead

Directed By: George A. Romero

Starring: Alan Van Sprang & Kenneth Welsh

“Survival of the Dead” takes place just a few days after the original Night of the Living Dead, after the dead began to walk. You learn there is an island, named Plum Island, near Delaware. On Plum Island there are two families that have always ran it, the O’Flynns and the Muldoons, and they have never seen eye to eye. Now with the dead walking and trying to eat the living, they disagree with each other even more. The O’Flynns believe every zombie should be killed immediately, while the Muldoons want to “save” the zombies by locking them up and waiting for a cure to be discovered. The Muldoons also hope they can teach the zombies to eat various animals instead of the flesh of the living. Soon, a group of rogue soldiers learn about Plum Island and decide to go there. Once there, the soldiers are caught in between the war that exists between the O’Flynns, the Muldoons, and the large number of zombies that ravage Plum Island.

Romero’s attempts at humor bore me. Maybe Romero is still stoked on Shaun of the Dead, but his idea of humor is not funny to me. Romero’s “humor” primarily comes in the form of different ways to kill zombies. Such as shoving a fire extinguisher into a zombie’s mouth or shooting a zombie in the head, only for the top of his scalp to fall on what remains of the stump of his neck. What makes stuff like this not funny to me is the CGI that is used to perform the kill. The CGI just looks like crap. So instead of laughing at the idea that the zombie’s eyes just burst out of his head because it just got filled with the contents of a fire extinguisher, I’m thinking, “God that CGI looks bad.” And to make things worse, a large number of zombies that are killed are done so in a “humorous” manner. “Survival of the Dead” certainly doesn’t need any comedic relief scenes because it’s not that scary of a movie. Maybe the pie scene worked so well in the original Dawn of the Dead because it was so kookie and most importantly CGI free. I just feel like zombie movies don’t need to have any CGI in them because so many good zombie movies came out in the 70s and 80s and last time I checked, they didn’t have any CGI in them.

CGI and humor complaints aside, there is actually a lot of cool things going on in “Survival.” For example, we get to learn new rules of what can happen in a Romero zombie movie. “Survival” teaches us that if YOU bite a zombie, you will slowly turn into one. There is another cool rule that we learn, but I don’t want to give it away because it is a minor plot twist.

The cinematography is absolutely beautiful and it does a tremendous job of capturing the countryside of Plum Island. If “Survival” really was shot near Delaware, I’m willing to go out on a limb and say that some parts of Delaware must be very pretty. The final still shot of “Survival,” in which we get to see what past Romero zombie films have taught us, is possibly my favorite shot in the movie.

The score is also very good as well. It does a great job of moving the action in the movie at a creepy pace. I found some of the “jump out scares” to be very effective due to the score adding something more to the scare. The gore that wasn’t done with CGI is worth mentioning. There are a couple of good body rips and a quick scalping in “Survival” that are fun.

I have read on the internet how some people believe this is Romero’s take on the abortion topic, with the O’Flynns being pro-choice and the Muldoons being pro-life. I think that is great that some people look for a deeper meaning in a Romero zombie movie. I also think it is cool if you just want to watch a zombie movie and see someone get ripped in half. Although some of Romero’s ideas are no longer fresh, as long as he keeps making movies, I will keep watching them.

6 out of 10:
Trailer for “Survival of the Dead:”