Review #126: Shaun of the Dead (2004)

This review was originally written in October 2021.

October 2021 Horror Movie Review #12- Shaun of the Dead (2004)

So obviously, this movie was a delight. I had definitely seen it before, but it was a long time ago- it's especially odd because I love horror and I've seen the other two Cornetto movies a million times, so why hadn't I ever revisited this one? I don't know, your guess is as good as mine. But now that I've watched Night, Dawn, Day, Land, Diary, Survival, Army, and Return 1-3, I have way more context for these types of movies than I did back in 2004. And this movie totally still holds up!

I do think it's worthwhile to mention that this is (arguably) a romantic comedy and not a horror movie, as the main driving force of the film is Shaun's relationships with his girlfriend, his mother, and his roommate. The zombie stuff is a big part of it too, but it's a solid thirty minutes before the protagonists directly encounter a zombie, so if it is just a zombie movie, it's a fairly slow one. Also, the zombie part of the story isn't exactly breaking any new ground- even in 2004 it was pretty standard zombie fare, but that's perfectly fine, because as I said, I feel the movie's focus is the relationships and not the zombie apocalypse. I can also say that, this time around, I totally appreciate how the joke at the end of the film is that they're going to be putting the zombies to work in menial jobs! I feel like that's 100% in line with what we've seen in the various Romero films thus far, so while it was surely meant as a joke, it's not far off from how previous movies have treated them.

I also wanted to stress that this movie (as well as Hot Fuzz and World's End, two equally amazing movies) is a master class in setups and payoffs. These movies CONSTANTLY drop in little details that seem like nothing at the moment, but get called back later on to pay off a great joke, either subtle or not-so-subtle. It's been said to death of course, but the fact that Ed basically spells out how the entire rest of the movie is going to go very early on (“We’ll have a Bloody Mary first thing, have a bite at the King’s Head, couple at the Little Princess, stagger back here. Bang! Back at the bar for shots") is just a fantastic bit of writing, and there's a dozen other examples of similar parallels that happen throughout the film. This movie is so intelligently-written, clearly made with enthusiasm and passion, and is bound to please anyone that watches it.

Overall Rating: 9/10 Pints at the Winchester

Goofy Memory: My wife Lisa always used to say that Dylan Morin's character looked like me, and I have to say, I totally see it.