George A. Romero is the godfather of zombies. Since his immortal 1968 debut feature “Night of the Living Dead,” which was the first film to portray the living dead as something other than a voodoo hex (instantly making it way less racist than any zombie movie that came before it), the filmmaker been chronicling the undead. He made a series of direct sequels (including “Dawn of the Dead,” arguably the greatest zombie shocker) and then decided to start over. A new era needs new zombies, or at least new social injustices that the zombies can metaphorically stand in for.
The result of this undead reboot was 2007’s “Diary of the Dead,” a jumpy, low budget you-are-there chronicle of a new zombie outbreak, as chronicled by a bunch of film school students that out-scared similar home movie horrors like “Cloverfield” and proved that the aging director (he’s 70 this year – still a decade younger than Clint) still has what it takes you give you goosebumps. It even ended up on the cover of Film Comment magazine, the highbrow egghead journal of the Film Society of Lincoln Center.
And now Romero’s back with a pseudo-sequel.
In “Diary of the Dead,” our heroes were briefly menaced by a bunch of untoward military folk. This time around, one of those military goons (really a member of the Pennsylvania National Guard) with the rugged name Sarge “Nicotine” Crocket (Alan Van Sprang) takes center stage. Well, maybe not center stage. But he is our surrogate as we enter Plum Island, a small landmass off the coast of Delaware, where two families of Irish hotheads, the Muldoons (led by Richard Fitzpatrick) and the O’Flynns (headed by Kenneth Welsh), have been feuding for years. The recent introduction of the walking undead to their relatively peaceful island certainly doesn’t help matters, either. Crocket and his small, multi-culti band of Guardsmen travel to the island looking for refuge from the zombie apocalypse. Instead, they get these pissed off white guys. And zombies. Refuge my ass.
The rest of the story isn’t particularly sophisticated, and while you understand that there’s some social commentary going on because, well, you’re watching a George Romero movie, you’re not sure exactly what he’s saying, besides some vague lefty notions of understanding and pacifism. (In a bizarre subplot, some of the island inhabitants are trying to teach the zombies to crave horse flesh instead of human goo.)
“Survival of the Dead” is a more straightforward pop entertainment than ‘Diary.’ This is a good thing. Gone is that film’s “found footage” conceit and with it the occasionally shaky “hey look, Grandpa discovered what YouTube is” feel. It’s been replaced by more surefooted storytelling that rises above the film’s noticeable low budget. Still, Romero gives it all he’s got and while it may lack the sizzle of something like “Zombieland,” he’s got the power of ideas on his side and can occasionally eek out a truly breathtaking shot or sequence, like the one that closes the film, which brings to mind a Tex Avery cartoon, a William Faulkner novel, and a German cuckoo clock, all at once. It’s snappy too. Romero may be a septuagenarian but he directs ‘Survival’ with more verve and vigor than the young music video pups that followed in his footsteps. And don’t worry, he doesn’t skimp on the red stuff either. There are some eye-popping moments here, sometimes quite literally.
In the pantheon of his zombie films, nobody’s going to mistake this entry for a classic. It’s a minor film, for sure. But if you’re in the right mood (and maybe slightly drunk), then “Survival of the Dead” is an absolute blast. It’s typically ambitious, even on its micro-budget, and when it’s on, it’s hard to find a better time at the movie theater (or at home, where the film is available On Demand). If crummy sequels and remakes like “Nightmare on Elm Street” have tested your faith in the horror genre, it’s time you take a stroll around this zombie-filled island but like all of Romero’s watch out — the humans are just as nasty as the ghouls. [B+]