It's sad to say, but Land of the Dead is to George Romero what the Washington Wizards was to Michael Jordan.
You remember Romero fondly for his past glories, and his incredible impact-- he practically invented an entire genre of film-- yet, no matter how much you want him to succeed in his newest endeavor, it just doesn't work.
Land of the Dead is not a terrible movie, nor is it incompetent. It is, however, pretty flat, and filled with so many logical flaws that I was distracted from the movie.
The plot? Read Roger Ebert's review, which is quite positive.
Surprisingly, my main problem with the movie has nothing to do with the central plot hook-- that the zombies have started to evolve some rudimentary intelligence. The whole thing is done like a zombie-representation of the "Hundredth Monkey" myth, or even the opening sequence to 2001. Most of these evolutionary moments are handled comically and made me wince a little, but oh well.
The gore in the film is excellent. The Tom Savini-educated effects crew supply lots of blood and guts, and a few inventive zombie moments.
The characters, with the exception of John Leguizamo, are uniformly boring and non-descript. The individual elements of the script won't win any awards, but it's good enough for golf.
So, what's my problem? I was disappointed in Land of the Dead's lack of realism.
Yeah, yeah, I know: what could possibly be less realistic than a zombie movie? The trouble is, all horror films (all films, period) have to establish some internal rules in order to permit the suspension of disbelief. Violate these rules, and the audience no longer has a solid logical center from which to enjoy the movie. Unfortunately, I found that Land of the Dead's internal rules can't possibly reflect the society portrayed in the film.
In Land of the Dead, a worldwide zombie apocalypse has occurred some unknown number of years previously. Romero insinuates that the film takes place in the same universe as the rest of his zombie movies, which means this all started around 1968. Which, incidentally, would have made the uncomfortably dirty-hot Asia Argento -7 years old when the apocalypse began. So, she's playing older, whatever.
Yet, the film doesn't look as if life stopped in 1968. The world has cel phones, Steyr AUG rifles, Kevlar, Palm pilots, and plasma screens. Despite the cultural/technological equivalent of a nuclear war, the Fiddler's Green community is modeled like a modern retirement community-- a concept that did not exist in 1968.
Okay, I know that Romero is creating an artificial world in order to make some of his infamous social commentary, and it's easier to make things look like today's world, only different-- but even the social commetnary is clumsy. But we'll return to that later.
Let's instead beging with by recounting some other holes [minor spoilers ahead, but nothing you wouldn't expect from a zombie film]:
The truck sure could use some handholds. . .
Continue reading "Movie Review: Land Of The Dead."
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