‘Dawn of the Dead’ is still Zack Snyder’s best film
The remake no one asked for – but turned out pretty good – turns 20 today
If you were a frequent visitor to movie nerd websites in the early 2000s, there was no greater heresy than the announcement that Universal was remaking George Romero’s zombie classic Dawn of the Dead – with a first-time director and a script from the guy who wrote Scooby Doo.
Romero’s 1978 movie is widely regarded as the best zombie movie ever made, and one of the greatest horror movies (I might still give the edge to the original Night of the Living Dead, but it’s close). It was a nauseatingly graphic yet subversively funny mix of terror and satire, situating survivors of a zombie apocalypse inside a suburban shopping mall to poke fun at capitalism in between rounds of gut-munching gore. Romero’s film still has a potent, eerie power, and even now it’s kind of baffling to think that a studio actually remade it.
It’s also kind of surprising that they handed the reins to a screenwriter best known at that time for his work for schlock studio Troma, as well an unproven director. Today, James Gunn and Zack Snyder are behind some of the biggest movies ever made and, for better or worse, have both helped steer the course of blockbuster cinema. But back then, it was hard to believe that these two rookies were being handed such revered material.
But in hindsight, it makes sense. Romero hadn’t made a zombie movie in nearly 20 years and, aside from Danny Boyle’s 28 Days Later, the subgenre was fairly moribund. That would change very shortly; Robert Kirkman’s The Walking Dead comics debuted in late 2003, and a few months after Snyder’s directorial debut, Edgar Wright delivered arguably the best zombie story ever with Shaun of the Dead; one year later, the popularity of both Snyder and Wright’s films gave way to Romero’s Land of the Dead. Shortly after that, zombies went mainstream, culminating in oversaturation with AMC’s adaptation of The Walking Dead. But at this point, the only other ongoing zombie stories that had some broad popularity were the godawful Resident Evil franchise.
Which meant, when we walked into the theater on March 19, 2004, Dawn of the Dead felt fresh, scary and exciting. It honored Romero’s source material and retained some of the social commentary. It had characters worth rooting for, plenty of scares and cringe-inducing gore. Watching it again, it doesn’t quite feel as fresh – it’s been lapped by other, better takes on the genre – but it’s still an entertaining watch, and still Snyder’s most human and grounded film.
Let’s all go to the mall!
In Snyder’s Dawn, Ana (Sarah Polley) is a nurse thrust into the beginnings of a zombie apocalypse after being rudely awoken early in the morning by her neighbor’s child, who quickly takes a bite out of Ana’s husband. After fleeing the city, which is already gripped with chaos, Ana crosses paths with cop Kenneth (Ving Rhames) and a trio of survivors. Informed that all the supposed safe havens are quickly succumbing to the hordes of reanimated corpses, they take shelter in a local mall, where they have to deal with an overzealous security staff. The group hunkers down, hoping to ride out the apocalypse until help arrives. It shouldn’t surprise you that it doesn't go as well as they planned.
The special sauce of Romero’s original Dawn of the Dead – and, indeed, most of his zombie films – was a heaping dose of social commentary. Night of the Living Dead has endured not just because it’s scary – although it is – but because it can be seen as a commentary on racism and the civil rights issues of the 1960s. Dawn of the Dead was a critique of capitalism, as the survivors ran to the mall for sanctuary and ended up enjoying the shops’ creature comforts as the world ended outside. Even the zombies seemed infected by a need to shop – they descend on the mall and it’s remarked that they’re heading there because, when they were alive, this place was important to them.
Gunn’s script jettisons most of the overt social commentary, although there’s a funny take on our celebrity-obsessed culture when the survivors play a game to shoot zombies who look like famous people, and a quick montage of them enjoying life inside of the mall, but it’s played more as a respite than as satire. The film’s humor stems more from Gunn’s knack with dialogue and letting his characters bounce off each other.
Instead, 2004’s Dawn is a fairly grounded mix of horror and action, and at that it’s pretty effective. It opens with a terrific sequence, as Ana flees a neighborhood where everyone is suddenly a blood-thirsty monster. Snyder films the chaos well, constantly tossing new obstacles and terrors at Ana, and Polley is very effective at capturing the sheer panic of someone who has to navigate a world falling apart before her eyes. It’s fast-paced, scary and laced with bleak humor, and it’s so good that the film can’t really top it.
Not that it doesn’t try, and I really wish Snyder would try his hand at more grounded, locked-room horror again, because he’s quite good on this smaller scale. He gets a lot of mileage not only out of scenes of mass carnage but smaller, scarier moments where threats can jump out of shadows and take people by surprise. A scene involving a horrific childbirth is tense and ends on a shocking moment that still feels transgressive for a studio horror movie. The scare sequences are quick, bloody and shocking, and when viewed before a million other zombie movies and TV shows made this all commonplace, felt visceral and scary. Even after our oversaturation of zombie content, it still works as an entertaining and fitfully frightening movie.
I suppose now is as good a time as any to talk about the film’s take on zombies, which was actually pretty controversial at the time. Rather than the shambling, shuffling corpses of Romero’s films – and, indeed, most zombie movies – Snyder makes his more in line with the rage-infected antagonists of 28 Days Later. They run, jump and snarl. And, at the time, this was a big bone of contention among film geeks. Because, after all, zombies don’t run. They amble, and the terror comes from the way they ultimately gather in mobs and overwhelm their victims (Boyle got away with this because his creations were not technically zombies, but infected humans).
Twenty years later, I don’t think anyone really cares, and my guess is that’s because Shaun of the Dead and The Walking Dead quickly course corrected back to slow zombies. And, yeah, that’s the type I prefer; it’s much scarier to think about being ultimately overrun and outnumbered by a slow, ambling mass. But I think it’s also forgotten that Snyder doesn’t really employ big, running masses of zombies a lot. Most of his zombie attacks tend to take place in small quarters and even in the end, when the survivors head out into the city to head for a marina, the hordes of zombies are scary because they’re a massive swarm, not because of their speed. It’s a bit of a non-issue these days.
Much of the film’s success is due to Gunn’s script. Even a good 10 years before he entered the MCU, you can see the themes of found family and redemption that would pepper his projects, including Guardians of the Galaxy. He has a knack for creating flawed and broken humans brought together by world-altering circumstances, and he gives each character either a need to prove themselves or a personal trial to push through, from Kenneth losing his brother and finding a friend in the gun store owner across the way to Mekhi Pfeiffer as a father-to-be who believes his only reason for surviving is to bring his child into the world. I like the overly agro security guard, CJ (Michael Kelly), whose preening machismo is a cover for his own fear, and how he gets his own redemption arc. Gunn’s script is smarter and more empathetic than you might expect, and he’s clever enough to know that not every arc should end in triumph, keeping the audience guessing on who will survive.
The cast helps elevate what could have been pure shlock. Polley’s mostly turned to directing these days – because she’s really, really good at it – but I miss the intelligence and quiet strength she brought to roles. Rhames is also really solid; it would be easy to play his cop as the stoic badass, and there’s a bit of that here, but I like the hints of sadness he lets drift into the character. I wish Jake Weber had a bit more to do than be the straight-laced hero and sort-of love interest for Ana; as the de facto leader of the group, he somehow fades into the background, but he really lands a moment where he laments that he was once a horrible husband but a good dad. It’s a striking emotional confession that hits unexpectedly hard, although I think his sacrifice at the end feels obligatory. I like that most of the characters are not straight-on good or bad guys; they’re flawed and they’re all stuck together, and most do what they can to help each other survive. The one exception is Ty Burrell’s rich douchebag, who remains an asshole throughout the film. I would complain that it’s one-note, but Burrell is really funny at playing dickish, and it’s somewhat gratifying to see him become zombie food in the film’s climax.
Zack Snyder’s good movie
I’ve made no secret that I’m not the world’s biggest Snyder fan. I think his style tends to overwhelm any substance in most of his films, and his brooding, bro take on heroism grates on me. He’s made films I’ve enjoyed after this – I think his Watchmen is flawed, but probably the best we could have hoped for in a straight adaptation – and there are moments of Man of Steel that work. But overall, he’s a director who always seems to be catering to 15-year-old boys; he has a good eye, but his movies mostly annoy me.
And you can see some of the seeds of that here. Snyder’s a little too aggressive with the sexual jokes (courtesy of Gunn, who’s also always had a proudly juvenile streak), and he can’t help but sneak in some gratuitous nudity. There’s a bit a desire to shock that he still hasn’t outgrown, although that’s probably a bit more effective in a horror movie than in a mainstream superhero flick. But mostly, Snyder acquits himself well.
This was the first and last time he’d make a movie that took place in anything resembling the real world – even his DC movies take place in heightened environments – and he delivers scares and action while keeping the movie fairly grounded. His characters aren’t big, fantasy exaggerations or broad archetypes; thanks to Gunn’s script, they have more shading and reality. Not that they’re deep, but they feel like people, something I don’t think Snyder has managed since. That opening sequence is still plenty terrifying. And Snyder’s flair with needle drops hadn’t reached corny levels yet – there’s solid use of Johnny Cash’s “The Man Comes Around” over the opening credits and fantastic use of a jazzy version of “Down with the Sickness.” And the climax, which involves a tricked-out armored bus complete with chainsaws, is a harrowing and violent bit of work.
The film also ends with akick to the gut, and not only because it cuts out on a gunshot of a survivor’s sacrifice. Four years before Marvel would make post-credits scenes an art form, Snyder delivers one of the best ending credit sequences I’ve seen, creating a found-footage sequel to the film as the audience is on the way out of the theater. The way the music drops out and the aesthetic shifts is effectively grim and scary, and it’s one final little bit of bleak humor before the whole thing is over.
Dawn of the Dead is probably not going to be on anyone’s list of the greatest zombie works, but it’s a solid entry, which is probably even more impressive given that it’s a remake of one of the bona fide classics. Sure, the genre would outpace it in just a few months, but Snyder and Gunn’s work reintroduced the zombie film to many and helped kickstart its resurgence.
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