Spook
Liberate Ex Inferis
- Joined
- Sep 15, 2005
- Messages
- 59
George A Romero's Land of the Dead
Run Time : 93 minutes
CERT : 15 (UK)
When I entered and sat down in a deserted cinema to watch this last night I could have been forgiven for perhaps thinking that the general public were attempting to tell me something. I'd never watched a film alone in a large cinema before. Rather surreal.
With that musing aside, onto the film.
To begin with, we have Fiddlers Green, the elite high-rise tower housing the 'rich and important' of the safe-haven and its leader Kaufman (Dennis Hopper). Those inside Fiddlers Green live in luxurious surroundings with a mall, designer goods and five star accommodation. Those outside live in the cities slums, a haven for the poor and those that have managed to survive the dead across the river and the electrified fence, but little else inside the wire. These people live a bleak existence. Some of these are mercenaries that work for Kaufman like Riley (Simon Baker) and Cholo (John Leguizamo) and are there to make 'runs' across the wire or under the river on the old metro line to bring back food, medicine, supplies and ammunition from towns within reach of their trucks, bikes and massive armoured 'tank', Dead Reckoning, like a ten wheeled truck from Hell covered with armour and armed with rocket launchers, mini-guns and all-kinds of anti-zombie devices.
There are problems though. Kaufman is corrupt, Cholo is working for Kaufman on the understanding of getting into Fiddlers Green, something Kaufman has no intention of ever letting Cholo do, and to make matters worse the zombies are learning and getting smarter, and Fiddlers Green is their objective for dinner.
First and foremost, it looks slick, a Resident Evil look with a Romero feel. There's a reasonable budget, the cast are good with a fun cameo, the effects and make-up are nice and the soundtrack is OK.
The problems I have however were with the plot, some of the issues raised in the film, and discrepancies between this film and their tie-in to the earlier three.
The social issues that Romero touches on are sharp, but I don't see how the dollar would be so crucial in a world where mercenaries that venture across the wire could raid a few banks in a few towns to get their millions rather than work for Kaufman and his cronies. 95% of the population are dead, so I can't see how the dollar would still be the main source of barter. Furthermore, those that live in Fiddlers Green must have some sort of mental problem. Surrounded on all sides against flesh-eating reanimated dead bodies and their priorities are getting a good deal on a mink coat and asking Marlene and Charles to dinner at their high-rise suite.
Then we have the idea of intelligent zombies. This in itself I don't have a huge issue with, since it added something of an interesting dimension to the film. But I have never liked the idea of making us feel bad for the zombies, or even manoeuvre us into rooting for them. Zombies to me are flesh-eating killing machines and monsters, not creatures I feel bad for or want to cheer on. The zombies also seem to be far stronger than in the earlier films.
Of course the soldiers in the film can't shoot straight to save their lives. Against zombie hordes the soldiers will fire their rifles on full auto (a waste of ammunition) and hit nothing but thin air, or miss the head, the one thing that can kill a zombie before falling over each others feet, tumble over a box and then get eaten alive. Kaufman must have hired Sergeant Bilko's old Platoon.
In conclusion, Land of the Dead is a fun film with some nice ideas, but is no where near the calibre of Night of the Living Dead or Dawn of the Dead. Whilst this is the most action packed of the series, the film was half an hour too short, perhaps an hour.
What made the people in the slums tick? What was life like inside Fiddlers Green and just how was currency used by Kaufman?
Dennis Hopper has some great one-liners, there's action and gore galore (a little too much gore for a 15 cert me thinks), and there's Asia Argento, who is beautiful to the point where the failings in the film almost don't matter. That said, a little more time to develop it would have made this a much better film.
7/10
Run Time : 93 minutes
CERT : 15 (UK)
When I entered and sat down in a deserted cinema to watch this last night I could have been forgiven for perhaps thinking that the general public were attempting to tell me something. I'd never watched a film alone in a large cinema before. Rather surreal.
With that musing aside, onto the film.
To begin with, we have Fiddlers Green, the elite high-rise tower housing the 'rich and important' of the safe-haven and its leader Kaufman (Dennis Hopper). Those inside Fiddlers Green live in luxurious surroundings with a mall, designer goods and five star accommodation. Those outside live in the cities slums, a haven for the poor and those that have managed to survive the dead across the river and the electrified fence, but little else inside the wire. These people live a bleak existence. Some of these are mercenaries that work for Kaufman like Riley (Simon Baker) and Cholo (John Leguizamo) and are there to make 'runs' across the wire or under the river on the old metro line to bring back food, medicine, supplies and ammunition from towns within reach of their trucks, bikes and massive armoured 'tank', Dead Reckoning, like a ten wheeled truck from Hell covered with armour and armed with rocket launchers, mini-guns and all-kinds of anti-zombie devices.
There are problems though. Kaufman is corrupt, Cholo is working for Kaufman on the understanding of getting into Fiddlers Green, something Kaufman has no intention of ever letting Cholo do, and to make matters worse the zombies are learning and getting smarter, and Fiddlers Green is their objective for dinner.
First and foremost, it looks slick, a Resident Evil look with a Romero feel. There's a reasonable budget, the cast are good with a fun cameo, the effects and make-up are nice and the soundtrack is OK.
The problems I have however were with the plot, some of the issues raised in the film, and discrepancies between this film and their tie-in to the earlier three.
The social issues that Romero touches on are sharp, but I don't see how the dollar would be so crucial in a world where mercenaries that venture across the wire could raid a few banks in a few towns to get their millions rather than work for Kaufman and his cronies. 95% of the population are dead, so I can't see how the dollar would still be the main source of barter. Furthermore, those that live in Fiddlers Green must have some sort of mental problem. Surrounded on all sides against flesh-eating reanimated dead bodies and their priorities are getting a good deal on a mink coat and asking Marlene and Charles to dinner at their high-rise suite.
Then we have the idea of intelligent zombies. This in itself I don't have a huge issue with, since it added something of an interesting dimension to the film. But I have never liked the idea of making us feel bad for the zombies, or even manoeuvre us into rooting for them. Zombies to me are flesh-eating killing machines and monsters, not creatures I feel bad for or want to cheer on. The zombies also seem to be far stronger than in the earlier films.
Of course the soldiers in the film can't shoot straight to save their lives. Against zombie hordes the soldiers will fire their rifles on full auto (a waste of ammunition) and hit nothing but thin air, or miss the head, the one thing that can kill a zombie before falling over each others feet, tumble over a box and then get eaten alive. Kaufman must have hired Sergeant Bilko's old Platoon.
In conclusion, Land of the Dead is a fun film with some nice ideas, but is no where near the calibre of Night of the Living Dead or Dawn of the Dead. Whilst this is the most action packed of the series, the film was half an hour too short, perhaps an hour.
What made the people in the slums tick? What was life like inside Fiddlers Green and just how was currency used by Kaufman?
Dennis Hopper has some great one-liners, there's action and gore galore (a little too much gore for a 15 cert me thinks), and there's Asia Argento, who is beautiful to the point where the failings in the film almost don't matter. That said, a little more time to develop it would have made this a much better film.
7/10
