The Living Dead

The play, Night of the Living Dead, written by Lori Allen Ohm has been rewritten with a bit of modification and touch of joy, in order to appear in the theater. This story inspired from the George Romero and John Russo classic film. From that, the play is produced by special arrangement. The play, Night of the Living Dead, was in Goppert Theater at Avila University. And Dr. Charlene Gould directs it. The play began on Thursday evening and continued through the last four days of February.

The horror genre has been captivating and enthralling the masses for centuries, but more recently in the twentieth century these morbid tales have moved from the old media of oral stories and literature to the new medium of horror pictures. Horror pictures still are not the end of the evolution of the horror genre, as this medium itself has experienced evolutions to satisfy an increasingly desensitized audience. To exemplify this evolution of horror pictures we will be taking a look at an occult classic from 1968 Night of the living dead and a new thriller The Walking Dead. Both horror pictures portray a zombie apocalypse and there are similarities and differences in the main characters, the zombies, and the worlds of the two pictures.

The foundation of horror genre was set by monsters that not only haunted your dreams but also conveyed rich themes found deep beneath the surface. Vampires are considered a symbol of seduction and sophistication while Frankenstein monsters represent misunderstanding, oppression, and rebellion. Some of the strongest symbolism is found in standard films of the horror genre does not come from the frequently updated relics. Utilizing fear and horror as mechanisms for subtext, social commentary, and symbolism, George Romero created a new horror genre, one that scares and shines just as much as great horror classics. Romero’s Night of the Living Dead revolutionized the once stagnant zombie film and made into something unstoppable, still to this day zombie movies rake in millions of ticket sales at the box office while remaining culturally relevant.

1968 was the year that North Vietnam launched the Tet Offensive against the United States and South Vietnam, the year that Martin Luther King JR and Robert Kennedy were assassinated, the year that started student protests and riots, the year that Black Power salute occurred and finally, the year that Night of the Living Dead came out. You may be wondering why a film would have anything to do with these historic events that occurred in 1968. Well, Night of the Living Dead is a zombie horror film directed by George A. Romero, this film that Romero created was a game changer for the film industry it lead to something bigger than purely entertainment. Romero’s goal behind his low budget black and white film was to construct subtext about social issues such as the Vietnam War and many other issues that went on during 1968. Romero’s zombie film’s present a sense of the failure of human co-operation.

Since it’s infancy at the beginning of the eighteenth century, horror has followed certain conventions that results in an awakening of the senses, evoking intense emotions of fear and terror in the audience. Horror feeds off triggering the primal fears embedded within all of humankind, creating a sense of menace that is the very substance of this genre. Furthermore, the central menace of a piece tends to enlighten the human mind to the world of the paranormal and the enigmatic, dark side of the unknown. The movie “Psycho” directed by Alfred Hitchcock is a perfect example. Infamous for its shower scene, but immortal for its contribution to the horror genre, “Psycho” was filmed with great tact, grace and art in regards to horror conventions.

Ever since the first zombie movie was created in 1932, there has been a constant rise of zombie appearances in popular media. Like with all monsters, the majority of zombie media aimed to represent a certain aspect throughout the society in question. Whereas vampires represented romanticism and Dracula represented how a certain social group was viewed during a certain time period, zombies in Romero’s “Night of the Living Dead” aimed to create a situation whereby a group of people had to survive a night together, despite their racial tensions between one another. Being the founder of all subsequent zombie films, “Night of the Living Dead” provided a guideline for zombie behavior. As time passed, more and more versions of the zombie came out, whereby zombies stopped being a plot device and turned into the focus of the film itself. The Walking Dead, currently standing as the fourth most popular TV series, took a turn from this progression and decided to imitate Romero’s take on zombies. By including zombies which simply aimed to sustain themselves by consuming the flesh of the “live,” the creators of The Walking Dead caused the remaining survivors to gather together and rely on primitive human instinct to survive. Even though the zombies in this series run rampant, they play a very minimalistic metaphoric role. Instead, by presenting the zombies as a plot device, the characters in this series were able to demonstrate their true prejudiced view on society, ultimately revealing

There has been a resurgence of zombie films in the last decade, ranging from Danny Boyles 28 Days Later to Paul W.S. Andersons Resident Evil. This renaissance of zombie cinema has resurfaced in response to the cultural, political, and social volatility experienced in today’s society, much like its predecessors. A zombie film, unlike other monster movies, plays more with the real-world fears and anxieties, presenting the audience with inescapable realities. However, to understand why this subgenre has been brought back into the mainstream cinema, a comparison is needed across generations of film. This paper will focus on the comparison between George A. Romero’s Night of the Living Dead and Danny Boyles 28 Days Later; in an attempt to show how zombie cinema is a reaction to cultural shocks.

The film, “Night of the Living Dead”, is a horror movie taking place in the late 1960’s and set in a small town in Pennsylvania. The beginning scene opens with siblings, Barbara and Johnny arriving at a cemetery after three long hours of driving. Barbara and Johnny went to the graveyard to visit their late father's grave and as they were leaving Johnny decided to tease Barbara saying “They’re coming for you Barbara… look, there comes one of them now”. While they were walking to their car Barbara figured she would apologize to the man for what her brother had said but as she was about to speak the “man” grabbed her. When Johnny saw, he quickly ran to them and pulled the zombie away from his sister but he was then attacked by the living dead. During the struggle, Johnny fell and died from hitting his head on a gravestone. The zombie then went after Barbara in a long pursuit that only ended when she came up to an abandoned house. While in the house, Barbara saw more of the zombie people heading toward the house and found a dead body. Startled by the horrifying sight, Barbara ran outside in a hurry and almost ran into a man that was walking into the house. This man, Ben, had run out of gas and was forced to stop at the house to seek shelter. Ben quickly grabbed Barbara and got them both into the house to safety. After getting rid of the three zombies that were after them, Ben boarded up the windows and doors as soon as possible. Barbara decided to tell Ben what had happened to her before they met. Ben decided to turn on the radio and get the news of what was going on around them. In hope of finding something useful, Ben looked in a closet and found a gun and ammunition. As Ben was looking in the closet, two men, Harry Cooper and Tom, emerged from the basement, while Helen, Harry's wife, and Judy, Tom's girlfriend, remained to watch over Helen’s Injured daughter. After fighting about where the safest place to be was, they all came to the conclusion that Harry would go back down to the cellar while Tom and Judy stayed upstairs. A little while after, Harry and his wife Helen went back upstairs and the group got the TV going to get an update on what was happening. After they watched the telecast, the group cooperated

In the “Night of the Living Dead”, it illustrates the year on which it's based pretty accurately in some ways, but not so accurately in others. In one case where the motion picture portrays 1969 accurately is when they said the cause of the dead rising was revealed as high-level radiation from a space probe, but you could compare that radiation to what nuclear fallout could be due to the cold war looming with the Russians. It also depicted how gruesome the Vietnam war was, like the blood, guts and how relentlessness the zombies were compared to the Viet-Kong. The way the movie depicted 1969 inaccurately was that there wouldn't be a black man in charge of a household of white men and women. That would be due to the reason that black people back then barely had any rights at all and weren't even seen as human due to racial discrimination. Also, movies during this time barely showed any skin on women, but you could clearly see in the movie that some women zombies were completely naked which was extremely unusual for 1969. In this movie, it puts in a lot of diversity that was very uncommon at this time, but it also broke the ice for future leadership roles to be African Americans.

“Night of the Living Dead” was the first of its kind. The movie was extremely advanced for the time it was released, which was 1968. It paved new ways towards an advanced style of horror films and opened doors up to more racial representation in the film industry. The film, for example, inspired future movie directors to chase after the zombie cult classic feeling. Zombies were such a hit in Hollywood, and they didn’t cost much to create. A little latex and fake blood could go a long way in old movies.

Horror can be defined as a genre meant to psychologically trigger individual fear with the presence of certain supernatural or abstract characteristics. The genre is dependent on people’s fascination with unrealism and the sensation that comes from experiencing fear personified into tangible elements on a screen. Horror films have thrilled audiences for decades, revealing stories of the more sinister parts of life. The popular allure that stems from the genre comes from the tension moviegoers experience when aroused by specific stimuli uniquely present in these cinematic features (Walters). Over time, as the genre progressed, the standardized elements found in a typical horror movie began to shift in different directions primarily due to changing societal circumstances and increasing consumer demand for cinematic innovation. The expansive nature of the different codes and conventions within the horror genre, coupled with the evolution of society’s fascination with these characteristics, has led to the mutation of the genre itself in order to allow for unique approaches to a familiar style in response to both economic developments and taste shifts within the consumer industry.

The horror genre has held a prominent position in culture for most of history. Beginning in folklore, used as a device to scare children into good behaviors (e.g. The Grimm Brother’s Fairy Tales), horror has integrated its way into the 21st century through film, and in recent years even video games. Yearly, primarily during the fall when the leaves start to brown and the natural eerie sense of fear fills the air around Halloween, the film industry likes to fill in the holes between its major grossing seasons by filling the audience with fear. However, it was Christmas of 1973 that defined the new age of Horror, when William Friedkin released The Exorcist. According to Julia Heimerdinger of Academia’s online journal, Horror, as a whole, can

This is the first evaluation essay, and it is in a book that the readers have read called the Nuit of the Living Dead. The story had the readers in countless suspense, especially the part when the setting takes place at the time of the zombie apocalypse. However, numerous people have been wondering the same question all their lives, which is this: “How do you understand your own identity, and how does it relate to the communities you are a part of?” and the question remains unanswered to this day, until now. (Center for Civic Reflection) The four topics that shall stand as the supports of this essay, which will help us with this question, and the four topics are the following themes listed: Loneliness, Paranoia, Fear, and Conditioning. (MoreStories102) Although the title of the story would make people assume that this is a horror story, it certainly is not. This story is just about a middle-aged man who is trying to keep himself busy at night, as he was afraid that the zombies would attack him. As he attempts to help a mouse in putting it out of its misery, a van pulls up with an older driver coming out asking for directions since he got lost. (Nuit of the Living Dead 452)

In Stephen King’s somewhat subjective essay in the 1984 Playboy magazine, Why We Crave Horror Movies, King describes his reasoning behind why so many people are fond of watching movies residing in the horror genre. The content of his essay, though inserted in an unconventional area for

Throughout cinema, there has always been space in our hearts for the gore and intrigue that come from horror films. Though they come with different plots, there remains “the monster”, the character that brings along disgust, horror, suspense, and even sympathy. In Alfred Hitchcock’s Psycho (1960), our monster is Norman Bates, the boy next door. This was one of the first times in American cinema that the killer was brought home, paving the way for the future of horror movies. According to Robin Wood in “An Introduction to the America Horror Film” (183-208), Bates follows the formula of the Monster being a human psychotic. This is conveyed through his normal façade portrayed with his introduction, the audience’s ambivalence, the use of