Two years ago, I attended Texas Frightmare Weekend where George A. Romero was in attendance.  Across the street, the theatre was showing his latest entry Diary of the Dead.  Obviously, since the man was at this convention promoting the film, I only felt it necessary to check out his latest entry.  I initially liked Land of the Dead, even though it definitely had some issues – most of which dealt with the writing.  Diary of the Dead felt like a out of touch man trying to merge technology with his classic story to try to make a modern film.  I felt that Romero was reaching to high with severely severed arms – like down to the elbow severed.  Diary just wasn’t that great.  The actors were horrible and the cinéma vérité style wasn’t executed well.  So, Uncle George created a new film, Survival of the Dead, and I decided to give the DVD a view. 

The Movie:

Survival of the Dead takes place in the same era or “generation” as Diary of the Dead.  The dead walking the earth is new to our characters, but they are finding managable ways to cope with the walking undead – usually, by blowing their brains out.

On an island named Plum, which is close to Delaware, there is a imbalance of ideas on how the undead should be handled.  You have Patrick O’ Flynn & his “family” who would like to eradicate the zombies one by one.  Seamus Muldoon and his band of merry men would like to keep the undead contained and try to teach them to feed on something other than humans, like horses and livestock in hopes of a cure.

The families have a feud with each other.  They also have these odd faux Irish accents which aren’t really explained.  I guess we are to assume the people on the island are Irish even though they are located near Delaware, not Ireland.  While this is all being set up, we are introduced to a military unit consisting of a man called “Sarge” – the guy that comes on the bus in Diary and tells the filmmakers to shut off the camera – as well as a couple of minority characters and a kid as they try to seek controlled refuge on Plum Island.

After a bit of a hassle to get on the island and past a banished O’Flynn-who is then captured by our militia buddies, they get to the island via ferry and realize that there is no evidence of containment as zombies, ahem…undead, are chained and shackled in hopes of the undead trying to return to their repetitious routines prior to them being alive.

What Romero does with this entry is focus more on his characters than his previous entry.  This is a good thing.  It seems like this film uses imagery from cowboy cinema with dusters, cowboy hats and horses galloping along barren terrain.  However, Romero doesn’t really explore anything new in Survival which is now starting to become a problem.  We all know Romero is king of the undead.  He introduced the zombie to the mainstream and most people know that his zombie yarns are used as allegory.  In this new film, it really just seems like Romero is going through the motions with another film just to film something.  Is he bored?  Does he not have anything else to say? 

I think Romero is a better director than he is a writer and I think it is time for someone to step in and tell Uncle George that he needs to stop writing his own films.  There is some great imagery in this film and it is competently made – unlike Diary - but ultimately has nothing to say.

Movie Rating:

The DVD:

Magnet Releasing puts out another great product for Romero completists or fans of the film.  There are three editions of the film on home media.  A 1-Disc and a 2-disc DVD as well as a Blu-Ray edition.

The review is based off of the 2-disc DVD edition.

The DVD is loaded with extras including Michael Felsher’s entertaining feature length documentary entitled Walking After Midnight which documents the making of Survival.  It also dips a little into the making of Diary as well.  There are some interesting stories to be found in this doc as well as some great insight on what goes on in the cold months of Canada when trying to make a film.

There are two audio commetaries, a short film (directed by Felsher), some clips that can be viewed individually or all at once which includes some footage from TIFF’s Midnight Madness, the Toronto Zombie Walk that happened that year, and some other clips.

Indy Mogul’s “How to create your own Zombie Bite” featurette is in here as well.

All in all, the features are greatly appreciated and well worth the price of the DVD/Blu-Ray for fans.

DVD Rating:

Bottom Line: If you are a fan of Survival of the Dead, the 2-Disc DVD or Blu-Ray is what you want to purchase.  At the time this is published, the 2-Disc DVD is only a $1 more than 1-disc and I can say that the extra features are far worth more than that $1.

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To everyone I met in Texas, thanks for being so kind.

End Music: “Dr. Phibes Rises Again (Demo)” by The Misfits – by request

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