LAND OF THE
DEAD - PREVIEW
 Land of the Dead
(2005)
Starring: John Liguizamo, Asia Argento, Simon Baker, Robert Joy, Dennis
Hopper
Director: George Romero
U.S. Opening Date: Oct 21, 2005
With zombies finally making it into mainstream horror
movies in the past few years with flicks such as
Resident Evil (and its sequel Resident
Evil 2 – Apocalypse) and the British 28
Days Later, the man who has practically invented the genre, director
George A. Romero with Night of the Living Dead
back in the late-1960s, has simply been left out of the loop! Even his
seminal 1970s classic was successfully remade without him last year (Dawn
of the Dead) and spoofed as well (Shaun of the
Dead)!
But now Romero is, ahem, back from the dead and filming
his latest zombie flick, titled Land of the Dead
—
20 years after his previous Living Dead movie, Day of the Dead
in 1985.
Anyway, as any horror enthusiast will tell you: a Romero zombie flick is
quite an occasion because, well, they are usually metaphors for something
more as you’d glean from this plot description:
The world is full of zombies and the survivors have barricaded themselves
inside a walled city to keep out the living dead. As the wealthy hide out
in skyscrapers and chaos rules the streets, the rest of the survivors must
find a way to stop the evolving zombies from breaking into the city.
See what I mean? Don’t ya just love Marxist Sci-Fi/horror movies? (The
last one was probably director John Carpenter’s
They Live way back when Reagan was still in White House.)
Plot description of Land of the Dead (2005):
In the 4th instalment to George Romero's Night of
the Living Dead series, the zombies have taken over the earth. The
surviving humans live on a small secluded strip of land, with two sides
cut off by rivers. The humans strive to survive, while outside the zombies
are steadily evolving . . .
—
Some sources:
Amazon.com, IMDb
 Trivia
about Land of the Dead:
-
George A. Romero was so impressed with Simon Pegg and Edgar
Wright's Shaun of the Dead (2004) that he
asked them to appear in this, the fourth part of his Dead series,
possibly in cameos as zombies.
-
One working title for the film was Dead Reckoning
but it was changed as to avoid confusion with the Humphrey Bogart film of
the same name.
-
There were three titles before Land of the Dead was
chosen: Dead City, Dead Reckoning and Night of the Living
Dead: Dead Reckoning.
-
Susan Wloszczyna, a reporter for USA Today, appeared as one
of the zombies. She was there interviewing her fellow zombies as well as
the director. She spent nearly an hour and 45 minutes in the make-up
chair.
-
A non-union zombie would make CDN$9 per hour while a union
zombie, for a minimum of 8 hours, would make CDN$158.
-
Asia Argento (Slack) is the daughter of noted Italian
horror filmmaker Dario Argento, who was the co-producer of one of this
film's prequels: Dawn Of The Dead (1979).
-
George A. Romero intended to make this film in his home
town Pittsburgh - the story is set there and it's where he made his other
zombie films. However his producers insisted on filming Toronto in order
to take advantage of Canadian tax incentives.
-
This is the fourth film in George Romero's zombie series
which Romero says it takes place after Night of the Living Dead
with no specific time frame. The last zombie film he wrote and directed
was Day of the Dead (1985) which was released twenty years ago.
—
Some sources:
Amazon.com, IMDb
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