Romero's Dead Trilogy different than all other zombie films

[Andy]

So if I read you correctly, and I think I do, you're saying...triffids...are...zombies! That means we can add mobile, aggressive plants to the list of what qualifies as zombies along with 28 Days Later Infected, Runners, howlers, ceiling crawlers and--my personal fav--"undead Romeroesque cannibal ghouls of indeterminate origin." You forgot the terminator, he's not technically alive and he is killing people so by neds standards, The Terminator is a zombie movie too

[AcesandEights]

You forgot the terminator, he's not technically alive and he is killing people so by neds standards, The Terminator is a zombie movie too I thought that went without saying Eh, no. I was making the point that because a film shares numerous things with another film, it doesn't necessarilly mean that it's the same type of film, or that it falls under the same genre, or subgenre. Oh, I know, but you forget your audience

[Ragnarr]

It's like I stated earlier in this thread; when push comes to shove, genre is all about perception. There is no definitive "Board of Genre Determination" that meets periodically to bang a gavel and state which movie is offically whatever genre (at least I hope there isn't). Until there is, I will continue to exclude movies like 28 Days from my ever growing collection of zombie films, and will instead place it with my collection of kool apocolyptic films.

[EvilNed]

This thread:

[bd2999]

I think it is the best there is honestly. There are some that might be on the same level and others that are close but most fall reall really short. technically speaking 28 days is more of a 'zombie' film than George's ghoul flicks. at least until he ever reveals the man behind the curtain on why the dead walk in his films. IS it some form of external influence like a virus or radiation or some other sci-fi take on the voodoo "zombie"? or something else entirely. Who knows? maybe in some other universe it was called night of the ghouls and it turned out there was some russel edgeington style vampire king raising these cannibal ghouls as an army? This confuses me a little but why does that make 28 Days Later more of a zombie film? I always thought that was one of the best things about Romero's world, or one of them, no one knows what causes it. The people who would be looking into it are dead or ran. And who knows if they would ever find anything. It is a situation that is not possible as presented, so why try to give an actual reason to something that is fantasy and fiction anyway? If you want to be honest, as much as I like 28 Days Later, and I really do, as a biologist myself it takes you out of the movie a bit for it to be a virus. Knowing the biology of these things takes you out of a movie fairly quickly unless it is done just right. There are alot of movies that equate virus or bacteria to magic. Which is fair enough and you need a suspension of disbelief for any sort of zombie movie. But in general you are safe if the approach is we do not know what is causing this thing.

[Danny]

This confuses me a little but why does that make 28 Days Later more of a zombie film? because unlike romeros films there is a concrete answer to what they are and why they act why they do. Some foreign body has completely overridden their free will and turned them into autonomous killing machines. They aren't the common walking dead variety, buy in terms of the humans they used to be they may as well be.

[bd2999]

I suppose but I think they have more problems with trying to be realistic than not. Does there need to be a hard and fast rule as to why they are driven to kill and eat people or other animals? I do not think it needs to be much more than what it is. It is a primal need that goes back so like has been speculated on in the movies that it is just the core part of the being that remains and not the parts that made them a person. One could argue that some of the virus driven stories are similar to say rabies. But honestly that is only the famous depiction of the disease. Sure the case of a rabid aggressive dog or animal is true to a point but not that extreme. I just see lots of problems with to much realism. If you go out of your way to make something real and define everything where is the mystery? People have studied many things for decades and do not know everything. Why define it all? I think 28 Days Later worked well for what it was doing, but there are problems with it from the perspective of a virus. The incubation time being a few seconds for instance. IMO that is just as fantastical as anything Romero did. Sure a virus once it enters can start infecting cells, although getting into a cell takes longer than that infection time. Let alone altering it's function and then multiplying the effect by infecting more cells. Along the lines of sometimes the horror comes from what we do not see.

[Ragnarr]

because unlike romeros films there is a concrete answer to what they are and why they act why they do. Some foreign body has completely overridden their free will and turned them into autonomous killing machines. They aren't the common walking dead variety, buy in terms of the humans they used to be they may as well be. ...soooooooo if I'm following you correctly, a zombie is MORE of a zombie if we as viewers know the precise reason of a zombie's initial zombifiction as it relates or is opposed to an infected non-zombie type of zombie, or at any rate not a zombie of undisclosed origin or vague zombification process. Got it! Just one question though; what the hell am I saying?

[krisvds]

Hmmmm. A bit confused on the whole 'Triffids' analogy concerning 28 days later. That film has way more in common with Romero's trilogy than anything else, no? Apart from the whole infected vs. undead debate it shares a lot of the conventions: an apocalyptic setting where the survivors are constantly under attack, not by monsters or plants, but by enemies that were once just like them. Enemies that, unlike say the body snatchers, have lost all sense of common sense. That act ravenous, relentless. Pure instinct as it were. That's what I percieve as a 'Zombie'-film. What sets Romero's trilogy apart for me is the dark humour, the satire. BTW not every film with the undead in them is generally percieved as a zombie-flick. To further complicate things ;-). Fulci's The Beyond features the undead but is generally not considered a 'zombie'film. Oh, and the shambling undead are the coolest zombies in school! By all means check 'The Dead.'