"Yeah, they're dead. They're all messed up." — Sheriff McClelland
Sick of the zombie craze kiddos? This is the one that started it all. Sure, other zombie movies were made
previous to this one such as King of the Zombies or what is often cited as being the first zombie movie, White Zombie (one could argue that the German Expressionistic classic The Cabinet of Doctor Caligari’s Caesare acted like a shambling corpse, but that’s neither here nor there) but these earlier films dealt with a concept of a zombie taken from Voodoo, rather than the typical flesh devouring corpse that we see today.
Y’see, audiences of horror films in those early days before the time of Saw or Hostel mostly consisted of bored latch-key kids. Sci-Fi as well was often called ‘kiddie stuff’. And so, when children filed in to go watch Romero and Russo’s horror masterpiece, made on a shoestring budget, they were totally unprepared. The rating system that we are familiar with today was quite different when Night of the Living Dead was released. In 1968, here was only GP (which stood for ‘General Patronage’ a moniker that is now taken by ‘G’) and Unrated.
Not to say that there isn’t scary stuff even in ‘kiddie movies’. Perhaps if you watched Bambi at a young age you got a fear of fire from watching the forest burn down, or if you watched The Brave Little Toaster, you had a sudden dislike of clowns, particularly those dressed as firemen. But those moments are brief, quickly forgotten as the film rolls on and only remembered in nightmares. With Night of the living Dead, you might as well slapped every kid in the audience, from the youngest at about 5 to the oldest who was probably about 12. It was probably the strongest argument you could have in order to putting into place a kind of rating system, and man, is it a rough ride for something made in the 60s.
A sense of despair fills the whole film. There is an overwhelming sense of dread, of despondency, that overcomes the viewer as the survivors of the farmhouse battle not only the external threat of the raised dead, but also each other. This failure to work together, to overcome differences and unite against the common threat is ultimately what dooms them. Whereas more conservative horror movies have a ‘call in the cavalry’ sort of ending to them, a cruel karmic twist is put on this. Not only is there not a return to normalcy at the end of the movie, but the apocalypse will continue, no matter what people will try to do to prevent it.
The film became public domain because the original distributor neglected to place a copyright indication on the prints. Way back in 1968, United States copyright law required a proper copyright notice for a work in order to properly secure and maintain a copyright. While the film display such a notice on the title frames of its original title (Night of the Flesh Eaters), the notice ended up removed when it changed titles, and by the time the filmmakers noticed, they could do nothing about it. As a result, you can watch it just about anywhere for free.
After the film became a surprise hit, Romero and Russo both put their heads together on a sequel, but they started to butt heads over how to do it. Russo went one way with his Return of the Living Dead series, and Romero went another. Night of the Living Dead received many facelifts and sequels with various quality, but none of them ever struck the chord that the first one did.
If you've never heard of this one before and you love zombie movies, watch it! Just don't forget -
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