Review #117: Day of the Dead (1985)

This review was originally written in October 2021.

October 2021 Horror Movie Review #3- Day of the Dead (1985)

After having such a great time with Dawn of the Dead, I was certain there was going to be an immediate drop in quality. (After all, I've heard people reference Dawn of the Dead loads of times, and only heard this movie mentioned a couple times in my life. Though that's more than I can say about the next few movies....) However, I was pleasantly surprised with Day of the Dead! Just as how I was very happy with how much the previous movie dealt with the quietude and the introspection that comes from living in the midst of a zombie apocalypse, Day really shows how the prolonged calamity takes a toll on the survivors. I could tell all of the characters were barely hanging on, trying to make the best of the world they've got left, and the different ways their frustrations came out throughout the film really made them all feel like fully-realized characters.

Granted, I haven't seen a lot of zombie movies (which is why I decided to watch so many of them this month!), but I feel like the number of movies that have characters focusing on doing anything more productive than just surviving and killing, is pretty low. But in Day, the narrative follows (among other things) a group of scientists working on how to rehabilitate zombies into something that could be of use to a reborn society. On paper it sounds like a silly concept, but I was watching with rapt attention as they managed to get one of the zombies to recognize household objects, salute a surviving officer, and even fire a gun. Again- super silly! But in practice (largely in part due to the actor playing Bub) I found myself empathizing more with this zombie than I did with most of the other characters!

And you can't really talk about this film without praising the special effects, makeup, and gore. The makeup was leagues ahead of Dawn (where zombies were mostly just ordinary people in ordinary clothes but with grey paint on their faces), and the practical effects were outstanding. There's a kill near the end of the film, where a character gets held down by the horde of zombies and his head gets torn off while he's screaming, and it looks AMAZING, even by today's standards! I'm honestly wondering why I DON'T hear more people talk about Day of the Dead. It's so good!

All in all, this was a fantastic film and I could tell a great amount of effort went in on the part of everyone involved. I am still eagerly looking forward to the next few movies, so fingers crossed that they don't suck!

Overall Rating: 9/10 Dead Army Men in a Freezer

Most Memorable Performance: Sherman Howard, who plays Bub (the main zombie). I never would have expected to care so much about the feelings and progress of a freaking zombie, but here we are!