Night and Dawn of the dead - Cult Films?

[Josh]

what do you all think about the night of the living dead and dawn of the dead being regarded as cult films? are any of you big cult film fans urself?

[zooooooooooooOm]

I for one love cult films. I am a cult film lover. I recently watched "Night of the Living Dead" with a some friends from star wars club, that was cultingly good. A cult film is used to describe a film that has had little to no success commercially and critically upon its initial release but has later spawned a small, but devoted and usually obsessive fanbase. Usually, cult films have limited but very special, noted appeal. Cult films are often known to be eccentric, and do not follow traditional standards of mainstream cinema. They are often considered controversial because they step outside standard narrative and technical conventions known. I think all of this could be said true for the George Romero 'Dead' series.

quim.

[Mike70]

i am totally fine with it. the status of cult film kinda makes it "our" stuff if you get what i mean.

i think a cult film is something that:

a. has a die hard following outside of the "mainstream"
b. is a movie that doesn't do well in theaters then blows up on home video. best example of this is john carpenter's version of the thing. which totally and completely bombed in theaters in 1982 but has gone on to everlasting love on home vid.

oh and by the way - welcome to HPOTD to the both of you.

[3pidemiC]

Nothing wrong with that. :)

[Danny]

ugh god, two years ago in film studies at college there was this big argument about this as NOONE in the class could agree on the definition of a cult film.

i think key examples are night of the living dead, donnie darko, rocky horror, city of god and broke-back mountain- all of these are considered niche movies with a following and they all have an effect on the audience, they do more than just entertain they provoke thought, a big example is bens death in night, the first time i saw that i had one of those "oh no way" moments as i couldn't believe romero took such a bold move narrative wise.
you can ask anyone what makes a cult ilm and they'll all give you a different answer, its just a unique reason for everyone.