Mesila
Graver
...Don't Fear...
Posts: 196
|
Post by Mesila on Oct 16, 2007 0:19:58 GMT -5
I think I should make it clear before going into this exegesis on zombie movies that I don't think of the Phantasm series as typical zombie film fare. The sort of films I'm discussing here are the Romero zombie films and the Evil Dead series, and others in this subgenre of horror films that have a certain quality of zombie that I think typefies a very prominent phobia which the films capitalise on, and entertain us with as well as scare us with.
I think that one primary reason that zombie films have endured over the years since the first Night of the Living Dead back in the fifties is the phobia of insanity. Notice that the undead in zombie films as opposed to the undead in vampire films are not immortals: they merely able to live past death. They don't have the capacity to maintain intelligence--a factor Romero skews and plays with a bit in Day of the Dead--the zombie becomes decayed in both the physical and mental senses.
But along with this decay the zombie seems to always be gifted with a persistence in its mindlessness - it will just keep coming at you, and its sole purpose is always narrowed down to one instinct: to feed on the living.
It occurs to me that this mirrors the fear that "sane", normal (living) individuals have about insane, abnormal, and/or drugged (zombified) persons. To some extent the fear is warranted. Zombies seem to get a strength boost due to whatever factor animates them from death, and it makes a rather clear analogy to the sort of bullheadedness one will encounter in a very drunk or drugged individual. In more extreme cases such individuals lose their souls, their moralities, and become naught but rabid consumers, and their rabid consumption furthermore tends to make more zombies. They say insanity is contagious, and sometimes "they" are correct.
Eventually decay claims the zombie but not the vampire. The vampire Undead also feed on the living, but note how they are portrayed in films - they can resist decay, and retain something of their humanity. The fear of the vampire is the fear of seduction into a soulless condition, while the fear of the zombie is the fear of being overcome by it against one's will--more a rape than a seduction.
Perhaps that's why zombies seem scarier than vampires on some primal level.
Now, in Phantasm, the zombies (dwarves, gravers, and other accomplices of the Tall Man) depart from this paradigm. They're being controlled by an outside source, and seem to retain the sense of purpose - we don't really know what Jebediah Morningside-cum-the-Tall-Man's purpose IS, yet--though Mike has guessed that his zombies are his slaves in the xenodimension, we don't really know for certain if they're enslaved, or if they're willing servants, or some combination of both.
Maybe some of these questions will come to be answered...but for now, all I do know is these are no "normal" zombies.
I've
|
|
|
Post by mirai on Oct 16, 2007 4:46:43 GMT -5
everyone has thier own take on the undead, same as the werewolf, vampire, frankenstein's monster
|
|
Mesila
Graver
...Don't Fear...
Posts: 196
|
Post by Mesila on Oct 16, 2007 9:08:12 GMT -5
everyone has thier own take on the undead, same as the werewolf, vampire, frankenstein's monster hello mirae, you will find this totally weird probably but that's my cat's name...I always have given cats names based on their voices, it's like the cat tells me what his or her name is, and her name was mirae! Welcome to the forum...what's your take on undead?
|
|
|
Post by mirai on Oct 16, 2007 9:16:09 GMT -5
actually mirai means future in japanese, but everyone makes mistakes
you're right about the decay, if you watch the remake of Dawn Of The Dead the older ones do start to decay
|
|
|
Post by gopher in heat on Oct 16, 2007 16:58:10 GMT -5
Bravo on making a topic about one of the things I love most!
Zombies are infinitely scarier than vampires, or any other ghoul for that matter. The reason is they are us. They aren't monsters per say... just empty shells of you or I. They have no agenda. They thrive on the primordial instinct to eat. To consume.
And in the end, isn't that what we ALL do?
Zombies are fascinating because they reflect humanity in almost every way, only on a basic, no-bullshit level.
|
|
Mesila
Graver
...Don't Fear...
Posts: 196
|
Post by Mesila on Oct 17, 2007 22:38:08 GMT -5
Bravo on making a topic about one of the things I love most! Right on Gopher, perhaps you can help me compile this list: I know there's a lot of zombie films out there and that I have seen only a handful of them. An incomplete list of zombie films:Night of the Living Dead Dawn of the Dead Day of the Dead - excellent Evil Dead Evil Dead II - Dead by Dawn - one of my faves Evil Dead III - Army of Darkness - (I have not seen this yet but probably will have by tomorrow) Hellraiser 7 - Deader (Here the comparison to the drugged is fairly obvious. Should note that in some ways Deaders are also a departure from the zombie paradigm: they seem to retain their intelligence, but their physical decay persists, though at a slowed down rate. Also these zombies also serve the cenobites in the way the Phantasm zombies serve the Tall Man; in other words, they're motivated zombies, not just mindless consumers.) The Dead Talk Back - Silly, MST3K movie I'm sure I've missed quite a few here and invite additions. Excellent. I think this is the point I was going for but managed to miss along the way - there's a certain sort of consumption that the crack head or junkie is known for, and many have drawn comparisons to the mindless consumption of the "normal" individual, who eats when he or she isn't really hungry, has sex when not particularly in heat, and when that's all done, consumes video, music, games, shopping, TV, et cetera as if these things are filling some gaping void, but like the flat-brained zombie on the doctor's table in Day of the Dead, the consumables seem to fall into an empty endless void - "more" is never enough. I spent the first two years in the 1990s addicted to heroin before I managed to hang it up with the help of a methadone program. That's one drug that does create zombies, and I think that's why the Undead fascinate me. Indeed I've been one, and not many of these real-life zombies ever make it back before the decay sets in and it's all over for them. That's one drug that really is as bad as they say they all are. All it really does when you come right down to it is create another additional need that the body and mind have, every bit as compelling as the need for food, water, air. When you go into withdrawal, your body is essentially learning to regulate itself again, and at first, it cannot, so all the withdrawing junkie knows is PAIN. It's the worst in the world. Thankfully, now all I do is watch the zombies on screen, I have had enough of being one. Though you make a fabulously legitimate point that on one level we are all mindless consumers from cradle to grave.
|
|
|
Post by The Never Dead on Oct 17, 2007 22:42:59 GMT -5
I can help compile a zombie movie list too if you'd like. I'm heavily into them.
|
|
|
Post by gopher in heat on Oct 17, 2007 23:36:36 GMT -5
Here's a list I got off Wikipedia... and while many of them are questionable in terms of being a "zombie film" or not (ahem... Scooby Doo), I have seen a pretty large majority of them.
* 28 Days Later (2002) * 28 Weeks Later (2007) * Army of Darkness (1993) * After Death (1988) * The Aftermath (1982) * Alien Dead (1980) * All Souls Day (2005) * Astro-Zombies (1969) * Battlefield Baseball (2003) * The Beyond (1981) * Beyond Re-Animator (2003) * Bio Zombie (1998) * The Boneyard (1991) * Boy Eats Girl (2005) * Braindead (1992) * Bride of Re-Animator (1990) * Bubba's Chili Parlor (2005) * Burial Ground: The Nights of Terror (1981) * Cemetery Man (1994) * The Children (1980) * Children of the Living Dead (2001) * Children Shouldn't Play With Dead Things (1972) * Choking Hazard (2004) * Chopper Chicks in Zombie Town (1991) * Cinque Tombe per un Medium (1966) * C.H.U.D. II: Bud the C.H.U.D. (1989) * City of the Living Dead (1980) * Dawn of the Dead (1978) * Dawn of the Dead (2004) * Day of the Dead (1985) * Day of the Dead 2: Contagium (2005) * Day of the Dead (2007) * Dead & Breakfast (2004) * Dead & Buried (1981) * Dead Heat (1988) * The Dead Hate the Living! (2000) * Dead Meat (2004) * The Dead Next Door (1988) * Dellamorte Dellamore (1994) * Diamond Dead (2007) * Diary of the Dead (2007) * Dead Air (2007) * Dead Alive (1992) * Demoni 3 (1991) * Doom (2005) * Evil (2005) * Fido (2006) * Flesheater (1994) * Flight of the Living Dead: Outbreak on a Plane (2007) * Gangs of the Dead (2006) * The Ghost Breakers (1940) * The Ghost Galleon (1974) * Heavy Metal, story "B-17" (1981) * Hell of the Living Dead (1981) * Hide and Creep (2004) * Homecoming (2005) * Hood of the Living Dead (2005) * House (1986) * The House by the Cemetery (1981) * House of the Dead (2003) * House of the Dead 2 (2005) * I Walked with a Zombie (1943) * I Was a Teenage Zombie (1987) * I'll See You in My Dreams (2003) * The Incredibly Strange Creatures Who Stopped Living and Became Mixed-Up Zombies!!? (1964) * I, Zombie (1998) * Junk the Movie (2000) * King of the Zombies (1941) * Killing Birds (1991) * Land of the Dead (2005) * Legion of the Night (1995) * Let Sleeping Corpses Lie (1974) * Lifeforce (1985) - Hybrid Space Vampires with Zombie behaviorisms * Mortuary (2006) * My Boyfriend's Back (1993) * Night of the Comet (1984) * Night of the Creeps (1986) * Night of the Living Dead (1968) * Night of the Living Dead (1990) * Night of the Living Dead 3-D (2006) * Night of the Seagulls (1975) * Oasis of the Zombies (1983) * Outpost (2007) * Pet Sematary (1989) * Pet Sematary II (1992) * The Plague of the Zombies (1966) * The Plague (2006) * Plan 9 from Outer Space (1959) * Planet Terror (2007) * Plane Dead (2007) * The Quick and the Undead (2006) * Raiders of the Living Dead (1986) * Re-Animator (1985) * Redneck Zombies (1987) * Resident Evil (2002) * Resident Evil: Apocalypse (2004) * Resident Evil: Extinction (2007) * Return of the Blind Dead (1973) * Return of the Living Dead (1985) * Return of the Living Dead Part II (1988) * Return of the Living Dead 3 (1993) * Return of the Living Dead 4: Necropolis (2005) * Return of the Living Dead 5: Rave to the Grave (2005) * Revolt of the Zombies (1936) * Route 666 (2001) * SARS Wars (2004) * Scooby-Doo on Zombie Island * The Serpent and the Rainbow (1988) * Santo Contra los Zombis (1962) * Severed (2005) * Shatter Dead (1994) * Shaun of the Dead (2004) * Shock Waves (1977) * Silent Hill (2006) * Slither (2006) * Stacy (2001) * The Stink of Flesh (2005) * Sugar Hill (1974) * Tombs of the Blind Dead (1971) * They Came Back (2004) * Teenage Zombies (1959) * Undead (2003) * Vampires vs. Zombies (2004) * Versus (2000) * Video Dead (1987) * Vengeance of the Zombies (1972) * Waxwork (1988) * Waxwork II: Lost in Time (1992) * Weekend At Bernie's 2 (1993) * White Zombie (1932) * Wicked Little Things (2006) * Wild Zero (2000) * World War Z (2008) * Zombi II (1979) * Zombi III (1988) * Zombiegeddon (2003) * The Zombie Diaries (2006) * Zombie Genocide (1993) * Zombie High (1987) * Zombie Holocaust (1980) * Zombie (2004) * Zombie Night (2003) * Zombie Nightmare (1986) * Zombie Planet (2004) * Zombie Town (2007) * Zombies of the Stratosphere (1952) * Zombies on Broadway
|
|
briggs
Zombie
Unlucky Caretaker
sphere ball attack man throat
Posts: 337
|
Post by briggs on Oct 18, 2007 5:57:33 GMT -5
Well, Scooby Doo on Zombie Island did have zombies in it, and not just guys in masks either. Waxwork and Waxwork 2 only had actual zombies for a few seconds (In Waxwork 1, a single zombie was brought to life and then killed by a sword through the stomach), although the re-animated were a big part of the first, and the zombies ended up having some large plot significance in part 2.
|
|
|
Post by gopher in heat on Oct 18, 2007 11:15:51 GMT -5
Yeah I know Scooby Doo had zombies... but I just have trouble classifying the whole film as a zombie film.
|
|
|
Post by mirai on Oct 18, 2007 11:16:54 GMT -5
i#d class that as a zomcom to some extent
|
|
|
Post by The Never Dead on Oct 18, 2007 11:55:07 GMT -5
Burial Ground = one of the most ridiculous zombie movies ever made
|
|
|
Post by scubasteve on Oct 18, 2007 17:34:43 GMT -5
Just been to the cinema to see Black Sheep. A New Zealand zomcom with killer sheep. One of the funniest things since shaun of the dead. Well worth catching
|
|
|
Post by gopher in heat on Oct 18, 2007 18:43:26 GMT -5
Burial Ground = one of the most ridiculous zombie movies ever made I know!!!
|
|
Mesila
Graver
...Don't Fear...
Posts: 196
|
Post by Mesila on Oct 18, 2007 21:06:27 GMT -5
"Video Dead" was something of a zomcom; I just saw that recently. Nothing like TV to create a zombie.
(I cheat and watch the eMule network. No dumbercials. But it still turns me into a bit of a zombie.)
|
|