Which Dead films are right for you?

I though a special rating system might help those of you determining which films to attend. I've rated each film in terms of how good I think it is (No Brains = check yours at the door, 4 Brains = Classic), and how gory it is (No Guts = Kid friendly, 4 Intestines = Eat at your own risk).

Night of the Living Dead (1990)

Dawn of the Dead (1979)

Day of the Dead (1985)

Land of the Dead (2005)

Night of the Living Dead (1968)

Diary of the Dead (2008)

ALL DAY OF THE DEAD

As all of you should know, this year marks the 40th anniversary of George Romero's seminal classic, Night of the Living Dead. On Wednesday, October 1st at 8pm, we will be screening the original Night of the Living Dead to celebrate the actual 40th anniversary of the October 1st premiere at the Fulton Theater in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.

Not to worry - for those of you who won't be able to attend that screening, you'll want to mark your calendars for the following Saturday, October 4th, when we have a special event planned. Starting at 12 noon and going until 12 midnight, we'll be celebrating the anniversary with a marathon: ALL DAY OF THE DEAD - all of George Romero's zombie films on our 104" wide screen!


Here's the schedule for ALL DAY OF THE DEAD:
12pm Tom Savini's remake of Night of the Living Dead (1990)
1:45pm Dawn of the Dead (1979) in HD
4:15pm Day of the Dead (1985) in HD
6:15pm Land of the Dead (2005) in HD
8:15pm Night of the Living Dead (1968)
10:15pm Diary of the Dead (2008)

We don't schedule a lot of marathons, because we recognize the effort those take to attend. That said, this anniversary was too near and dear to our heart to let it pass without doing something special. While you're in for a good time if you come for the whole day, I urge you to come out if only for one or two films. The current popularity of flesh eating zombies in fiction and film all stems back to this independent production from the fall of 1968, so what better time to revisit, or introduce yourself to, the most important American horror film of all time.

RARE! Behind the scenes footage from Night '68

We are merely passing through history. This IS history.



Special thanks to YouTube user WIICTVFAN for making this available.

The 40th anniversary is just a week away. Hope to see you at All Day of the Dead.

We interrupt this program...

In the unlikely event that you stumbled across this blog and haven't been keeping up on the Slaughtered Lamb Cinema blog, please read this post to find out how All Day of the Dead has become a fundraiser for Bob Wilkins, host of Creature Features in the Bay Area while we were growing up.

Diary of the Dead 2008

Following the high profile major studio release of Land of the Dead, George Romero longed for a return to his independent roots.

With Diary of the Dead, Romero sacrificed a bigger budget for greater creative control. While some have described the film as The Blair Witch Project meets Night of the Living Dead, that's an oversimplification. A group of film students are working on a school project when the dead begin returning to life. As they begin to understand what is going on, they decide to turn their cameras to document the situation.

This time out, Romero is commenting on how our society has come to communicate news. Not through formal sources, but through the independent viewpoints of those people who document and upload their footage online.

It's an effective film, and a welcome addition to Romero's ouevre, and a fitting close to the official programming for All Day of the Dead.

P.S. If there is sufficient interest, we may also have a midnight screening of the 2004 Dawn of the Dead remake.

Night of the Living Dead 1968

Volumes have been written about the importance and impact of George A. Romero's Night of the Living Dead.

It remains my favorite horror film of all time, and it led me to discover my favorite book of all time, I Am Legend, which the story was inspired by.

Here we are, 40 years after the film's release, and it hasn't lost any of its potentcy. Though it was a regular feature as a midnight movie in New York, and on the drive-in circuit around the country, I'm guessing that only a handful of you have seen it on the big screen.

The trailer for Dawn of the Dead describes Night as the "classic horror film of its time." I contend that it remains the classic horror film of all time.

We hope you will join us for our prime time screening to celebrate the 40th anniversary of this classic.

Land of the Dead 2005

2005 was a busy year for us. We attended the premiere of Revenge of the Sith in San Francisco, went to the George Lucas AFI lifetime achievement presentation in Hollywood, and attended the premiere screening of Land of the Dead at the Palms in Las Vegas, with George Romero in attendance.

Once again, Romero brought us a thoughtful zombie film for a new generation. The living had become so overrun with the dead, that they had begun to ignore the problem. Separated from the living dead by bodies of water on three sides, and an electrified fence running the land based perimeter, a new human society prospers. Or do they - the haves live in luxury, the have-nots live in the gutter, working for the man - in this case played by Dennis Hopper.

Romero furthers his concept of the dead retaining some knowledge of their past existence by taking the remerging intelligence of the living dead to the next level. And he continues to populate his films with appropriate, feasible behaviors - such as the living using fireworks to distract the zombies so they can loot the formerly populated areas that are now in the land of the dead.

The film came at a time when the question kept coming up - how is it that zombies have become so popular in our culture, and yet the man responsible for the trend can get financing to make them. Well, with Universal behind him, Romero was given the chance to make his biggest budget zombie film. Unfortunately, being a major studio production brought with it all the related baggage.

As a fan who never though he'd live to see Romero produce another zombie film, I was quite disappointed to learn that the film would not be shot in Pittsburgh (where as far back as 1985 I had pledged I would go for the chance to appear as a zombie in a Romero movie). For purely financial reasons (considering the film was designed around the specific locale of Pittsburgh), it was shot in Canada.

I still find Land of the Dead to be an extremely thoughtful and entertaining addition to the series.

We hope you'll join us for George Romero's biggest budget zombie epic.