Rented Survival last night....

[zombie_killer]

Sorry to inform you guys, but Romero's new movie is one of the worst zombie films ever. I rank it only slightly higher than the dreaded Day of the Dead remake. The plot and script are bad, even for a B movie. I feel like it was rushed, maybe he ran out of money to finish the project. What he wanted to accomplish plot wise could have filled a two hour movie, not 1hr. 24min. The gore effects are weak, mostly CGI that doesn't look real or imaginative, like Savini special effects once did. There is an attempt at dark humor, but it makes the movie amatuerish rather than hilarious. Romero dropped the ball by not sticking to his roots as a master of horror. I even will defend Land and Diary, as I liked both depsite all the cirticism. I still love Romero, but this movie hurts me. I can explain more if you like, but I don't want to post a lot of spoilers in case you want to see it for yourself.....

In closing, even if you thought the story was lacking in previous movies, you could always depend on the zombie killing and gore. Not the case with this movie. The special effects are as lame and the plot and the acting.

[Danny]

http://i3.photobucket.com/albums/y91/khazrak/Cool_story_bro.gif

[bassman]

Sorry to inform you guys, but Romero's new movie is one of the worst zombie films ever.

I stopped taking you seriously after that. Survival isn't a fan favorite and is down right hated by some, but one of the worst ever it is not. There are WAY too many other shit zombie films for that category.

[SymphonicX]

I stopped taking you seriously after that. Survival isn't a fan favorite and is down right hated by some, but one of the worst ever it is not. There are WAY too many other shit zombie films for that category.

Yeah that little piece of drama at the start of his post might get a few noses pointing north...

But by and large I know his comments are basically valid - but what really gets me, and I will NEVER understand this....is when people say Survival is worse than Diary...

I mean....are we watching the same films? Cos...Diary is fucking unwatchable man....UNWATCHABLE. It's cringingly embarassing. At least Survival wasn't a gimmicky mess of bullshit social messages - Survival had a bit more subtlety to it.

Yeah the gore is pretty awful, the heads on sticks were particularly embarassing - I could have done better on AFX CS3 or bloody avid effects.

But it had really, really strong moments - like when they get to the island and find the zombies chained up "working" and stuff. The opening 10 minutes are pretty strong (as with Land too), and some of the characters are likeable, and most importantly the movie has a sense of progression and dare I say, adventure.

Diary though was like a bad teen comedy road trip movie, without the comedy...absolutely awful.

So yeah Survival isn't the best film in the world but I can't see any reason to peg it below Diary, cos that really is one of the worst zombie films ever made IMO.

[JDFP]

But by and large I know his comments are basically valid - but what really gets me, and I will NEVER understand this....is when people say Survival is worse than Diary...


Not only is "DIARY" better than "SURVIVAL", but it's also better than "LAND", too. Hell, "SURVIVAL" was better than "LAND", IMO. See, this always begins the never-ending debate on: "This Romero flick from the nouveau trilogy didn't suck as badly as that one!" and then we all argue and bicker for about 30 posts in a thread as to why this one sucked more and why that one sucked less -- ultimately realizing that the original trilogy is like staring up at the light of blue label Johnny Walker while being stuck with Evan Williams to drink instead (the new trilogy).

So, you'll never understand why I (and alot of other people) like "DIARY" better than "SURVIVAL" and "LAND". Okay. I guess to each their own, really. I feel the same way you feel about "DIARY" about "LAND" myself. I think "LAND" is unwatchable tripe in which Romero could only improve upon with his next film (which he did by leaps and bounds, IMO, with "DIARY). It's all subjective...

Man, I'm always up for a good debate, but even I am even getting tired of this "This one was better, no, this one was!" discussions. It just promotes headaches and none of us ever change our opinions of our taste preferences. :)

To the O.P.: If you think "SURVIVAL" is the worst zombie flick of all time you've apparently not seen but a handful of films in your life. While I agree "SURVIVAL" was quite dreadful in places, it's a Cannes-worthy / BAFTA-worthy / Academy frickin-Award worthy work of greatness compared to about 80% of supposed "zombie" flicks out there. Being this is your first post that you've made here, I won't go any further than that in realizing that you forgot to look around you and realize: "Hey, this HPotD site is set up an dedicated for ROMERO fans!" as opposed to being just a 'general' zombie site. Sure, we all get into different horror and different zombie films, but the primary dedication here is for Romero. Tread lightly, my friend. :)

j.p.

[Trin]

It seems to me the OP is heavy on wanting gore and effects in a zombie movie. Judged on those terms Survival may very be one of the worst ever. The zombie kills were ridiculous to the point of being comedic (perhaps intentionally), the CGI was so standout that I could tell it was there (which is really saying something), and there was a distinct lack of gore.

Personally, I couldn't care less about those elements, but to give the OP some credit I think that judged on those terms there's some validity to his stance.

[SymphonicX]

Not only is "DIARY" better than "SURVIVAL", but it's also better than "LAND", too. Hell, "SURVIVAL" was better than "LAND", IMO. See, this always begins the never-ending debate on: "This Romero flick from the nouveau trilogy didn't suck as badly as that one!" and then we all argue and bicker for about 30 posts in a thread as to why this one sucked more and why that one sucked less -- ultimately realizing that the original trilogy is like staring up at the light of blue label Johnny Walker while being stuck with Evan Williams to drink instead (the new trilogy).

So, you'll never understand why I (and alot of other people) like "DIARY" better than "SURVIVAL" and "LAND". Okay. I guess to each their own, really. I feel the same way you feel about "DIARY" about "LAND" myself. I think "LAND" is unwatchable tripe in which Romero could only improve upon with his next film (which he did by leaps and bounds, IMO, with "DIARY). It's all subjective...

Man, I'm always up for a good debate, but even I am even getting tired of this "This one was better, no, this one was!" discussions. It just promotes headaches and none of us ever change our opinions of our taste preferences. :)

To the O.P.: If you think "SURVIVAL" is the worst zombie flick of all time you've apparently not seen but a handful of films in your life. While I agree "SURVIVAL" was quite dreadful in places, it's a Cannes-worthy / BAFTA-worthy / Academy frickin-Award worthy work of greatness compared to about 80% of supposed "zombie" flicks out there. Being this is your first post that you've made here, I won't go any further than that in realizing that you forgot to look around you and realize: "Hey, this HPotD site is set up an dedicated for ROMERO fans!" as opposed to being just a 'general' zombie site. Sure, we all get into different horror and different zombie films, but the primary dedication here is for Romero. Tread lightly, my friend. :)

j.p.


You don't have to chime in on it man, the point was made and I responded to it - if it gives you a headache feel free to walk away :)
Personally I like the debate, and I'd like to hear over and over why some hate Land and some hate Diary in equal measures, it gets us thinking about the films and often we come back with different elements or things we like or hate, different reasoning, which leads to analysis of the movies - which is the point of the board.

I certainly don't want to open up a circular debate where we're just talking smack about each other's favourite movies but it's always good to chat about this stuff in a friendly manner :) If my briefly written post made you think that's what I was after, I apologise and I can certainly see how you thought that...sorry :)

[JDFP]

You don't have to chime in on it man, the point was made and I responded to it - if it gives you a headache feel free to walk away :)
Personally I like the debate, and I'd like to hear over and over why some hate Land and some hate Diary in equal measures, it gets us thinking about the films and often we come back with different elements or things we like or hate, different reasoning, which leads to analysis of the movies - which is the point of the board.

I certainly don't want to open up a circular debate where we're just talking smack about each other's favourite movies but it's always good to chat about this stuff in a friendly manner :) If my briefly written post made you think that's what I was after, I apologise and I can certainly see how you thought that...sorry :)

It's all groovy man, there for a second I just shook my head and thought: "Oh, great Maggie Gyllenhaal! Here we go again!". Nothing personal of course, you always do a great job of articulating your posts and you're absolutely right... we are here to discuss the great flicks (and not so great flicks as well). Sometimes it just seems that we get caught up in a circular debate with it (the whole "LAND" V. "DIARY" thing, and now we throw "SURVIVAL" into the mix) though on the whole "Which one sucks more?" debate sometimes. My response was more gut reaction as opposed to reaction to your post itself. It's all good, man. :cool:

j.p.

[Trin]

Personally I like the debate, and I'd like to hear over and over why some hate Land and some hate Diary in equal measures, it gets us thinking about the films and often we come back with different elements or things we like or hate, different reasoning, which leads to analysis of the movies - which is the point of the board.
That was the fun part of the old Land Haters thread. It was a lot of arguing, but a lot of interesting points came out too.

I'm still thinking on Survival so these posts are good for me. My opinion is not fully birthed yet. I've been compiling a list of thoughts and a lot of these little discussions add points to the list.

Btw - I hated Land, then mellowed, then hated it again, then saw Diary and hated it, which made me like Land more by comparison, then watched Land again and was okay with it cause I ignored the parts I hated, then watched Diary again and still hated it, then saw Survival and was okay with it, then read a bunch here and kinda hated it, and want to watch it again. That's my opinion and I'm very unlikely to stick to it.

It's really amazing how the latest 3 have been so universally discordant. People love some, hate some, tolerate some, but no two people seem to be able to agree on which some is which.

[ProfessorChaos]

i rented survival the other day, and i actually had to turn it off...i was that let down by what i saw.

and before anyone says anything like "you just want another dawn of the dead! derp!", that's not the case. land was tolerable, diary was a bit better, but this was just wretched...here's a quick list of the top of my head of things i can recall:

1. worst acting ever
2. least likeable characters ever
3. horrible accents
4. terrible cgi all over the place
5. that grenade blew up and took out a huge portion of that wall and those dudes are standing there looking like cartoon characters who used dynamite as birthday candles
6. terrible dialogue: (referring to in car) "yeah, but he'll never pass his driving test.":rolleyes:

from the little i saw, i could go on for quite a while about this, but i think i've made my point.

[Sammich]

I saw SOTD and liked it alot.

Worst zombie move ever though? Have you ever seen a movie called ZOMBIE NATION? Watch that and see if you can seriously still say SOTD is the worst.

[ChokeOnEm]

Yeah that little piece of drama at the start of his post might get a few noses pointing north...

But by and large I know his comments are basically valid - but what really gets me, and I will NEVER understand this....is when people say Survival is worse than Diary...

I mean....are we watching the same films? Cos...Diary is fucking unwatchable man....UNWATCHABLE. It's cringingly embarassing. At least Survival wasn't a gimmicky mess of bullshit social messages - Survival had a bit more subtlety to it.

Yeah the gore is pretty awful, the heads on sticks were particularly embarassing - I could have done better on AFX CS3 or bloody avid effects.

But it had really, really strong moments - like when they get to the island and find the zombies chained up "working" and stuff. The opening 10 minutes are pretty strong (as with Land too), and some of the characters are likeable, and most importantly the movie has a sense of progression and dare I say, adventure.

Diary though was like a bad teen comedy road trip movie, without the comedy...absolutely awful.

So yeah Survival isn't the best film in the world but I can't see any reason to peg it below Diary, cos that really is one of the worst zombie films ever made IMO.

Well stated. You just saved me a post. Agreed 100%.

[zombie_killer]

I wonder if Romero actually directed this movie. Nothing about it screams George Romero, master of horror. This movie is like a bad horror flick with a big name attached to it in a producer's role. I know there are worse zombie movies, but when you consider the icon that Romero is, this effort is unacceptable. BTW, Diary is much better that Survival. I agree, the social commentary was thick, but the special effects and the action was much better (in Diary). I almost quit watching Survival, but I invested the money to rent it so I followed through. One of my "favorite" bad scenes was when the protagonist shoots a zombie in the chest with a flare gun and watches its head light up before lighting his cig with its head. Not only is it not realistic, but it wasn't funny either.... ridiculous is more like it. As for the crummy plot, how about when he drops the twins on you with no hints early on. You learn not to do that stuff in intro to creative writing.

[DjfunkmasterG]

Have you seen LAND?

The believe me this is from Romero... just slightly better than Land in terms of time wasted. I only felt I lost 45 minutes compared with Land where I lost 97 minutes.

[bassman]

I wonder if Romero actually directed this movie. Nothing about it screams George Romero, master of horror..

I think just about everyone here can agree that Romero's master days are behind us. He had a good run, but you can only catch lightning in a bottle so many times. It really is amazing that he was able to do it as much as he did.

[JDFP]

I think just about everyone here can agree that Romero's master days are behind us. He had a good run, but you can only catch lightning in a bottle so many times. It really is amazing that he was able to do it as much as he did.

Maybe it's part of his master plan. To shock everyone into thinking he can't do it anymore just to come out with a brilliant work of film-making to light up a cigarette and say: "Hah! Take that!".

I'm hoping that Romero can prove us all wrong and surprise us. It's always possible... to quote Peter: "You never know." :)

j.p.

[DjfunkmasterG]

Maybe it's part of his master plan. To shock everyone into thinking he can't do it anymore just to come out with a brilliant work of film-making to light up a cigarette and say: "Hah! Take that!".

I'm hoping that Romero can prove us all wrong and surprise us. It's always possible... to quote Peter: "You never know." :)

j.p.

Well when he does that... I will quit making films. :D

[clanglee]

I liked survival quite a bit. . . .maybe because I was so disappointed in the past 2 movies that I stopped waiting for a wonderful movie and was just content to enjoy the film as it is. There are some very silly things going on in Survival. . .but man. . to me it blew Diary out of the water. Diary was . . . at best. . . .boring. Survival at least didn't have that problem. Like Trin. . .Land has grown on me a bit. . . definitely after being exposed to the sad trite and yawn inducing Diary.

[SymphonicX]

I wonder if Romero actually directed this movie. Nothing about it screams George Romero, master of horror. This movie is like a bad horror flick with a big name attached to it in a producer's role. I know there are worse zombie movies, but when you consider the icon that Romero is, this effort is unacceptable. BTW, Diary is much better that Survival. I agree, the social commentary was thick, but the special effects and the action was much better (in Diary). I almost quit watching Survival, but I invested the money to rent it so I followed through. One of my "favorite" bad scenes was when the protagonist shoots a zombie in the chest with a flare gun and watches its head light up before lighting his cig with its head. Not only is it not realistic, but it wasn't funny either.... ridiculous is more like it. As for the crummy plot, how about when he drops the twins on you with no hints early on. You learn not to do that stuff in intro to creative writing.


Actually all very valid points there...

---------- Post added at 07:53 AM ---------- Previous post was at 07:47 AM ----------


It's all groovy man, there for a second I just shook my head and thought: "Oh, great Maggie Gyllenhaal! Here we go again!". Nothing personal of course, you always do a great job of articulating your posts and you're absolutely right... we are here to discuss the great flicks (and not so great flicks as well). Sometimes it just seems that we get caught up in a circular debate with it (the whole "LAND" V. "DIARY" thing, and now we throw "SURVIVAL" into the mix) though on the whole "Which one sucks more?" debate sometimes. My response was more gut reaction as opposed to reaction to your post itself. It's all good, man. :cool:

j.p.

awesome :) Let me ask you something...!

When you watched Diary did you love it for the FX and gore? A couple of people here have claimed to prefer Diary because of the action sequences and gore and whatnot, do you feel this is what made Diary stronger?

I'm having a theory here and there's a sort of dividing line between the fans - one section cares less about gore and more about that sense of adventure in the story and decent plot points, whilst another side can sort of let that stuff go if the movie delivers shocks, scares and an intense atmosphere and little moments that make you think, but with the main focus being a HORROR MOVIE....maybe there's a sort of different focus and Survival and Diary are so completely different in those respects that neither delivers both in equal measures (diary has better gore and action sequences and has a style, whereas Survival is more generic, has shitty gore but IMO a better character set and overall sense of adventure, bigger set pieces etc etc)

Also to whoever made the point about the dynamite exploding leaving comedy charred faces behind a shed, and the introduction of the random twin to make us go "ahhhhh" is totally right - cheap tricks used in a teenager's short story for A-level English Literature..."And then it was all a dream...!!!"

---------- Post added at 09:37 AM ---------- Previous post was at 07:53 AM ----------

actually maybe thinking about it I reckon the real issue with all of us is this...

the new movies just aren't mature enough.

[Trin]

There is definitely a difference in what people are looking for from their Dead movies. Zombie_killer likes Diary and states reasons like gore and cgi. I don't like Diary and state reasons like weak characters, poor motivation, and no plot. We're both right. Diary should've been called "Zombie Vignettes" because it's really just about a group of people driving around encountering zombies in various settings killing them in odd ways. If that's your thing you'll love it.

Survival is much more a story about characters and interpersonal conflicts. I can see some parallel with Survival to Day - a lot of people are irritated with the base conflict between the characters and asking, "Why do I care about any of these people?" If you dig the flawed characters and somewhat over-the-top portrayal of human frailty then you'll dig Survival. If you love special effects and gore then Survival is gonna seem silly and lacking.

I'll agree that Romero's writing style has degraded over the years. The surprise twin thing was gimmicky. Just like the handheld camera thing in Diary.

[Rancid Carcass]

...cheap tricks used in a teenager's short story for A-level English Literature..."And then it was all a dream...!!!"

If I were going to write a zombie movie set in an old missle silo - that's how I'd end it too... :shifty:

[zombie_killer]

As critical as I am, I think Survival could have been really good. What Romero was trying to do was interesting, the execution was poor. The themes he was going for needed to be explored in a much longer movie, ala Dawn. The characters have unrealized potential due to the limited (and short) script, IMO. If Romero wanted to do something that "is so bad it is good," then he needed to take notes from Richard Rodriguez. Planet Terror is the perfect example. He pays homage to crappy B-movies, but it is so well done, it is enjoyable. There a lots of laughs in that movie, because stuff is so silly. It doesn't try to be scary. That is where Survival fails. Is it a horror moive or dark comedy? IMO, Romero makes horror movies. Gross us out with the effects. If not, get a top notch writer with a clear vision and give us a compelling story. I'm all for horror movies with depth. They are so rare nowadays. I normally don't post, but I was really disappointed with this effort. Romero is one of my favorite directors. I didn't expect an Oscar winning script, but I did expect top of the line effects. I was totally disappointed in the special effects. After all, that is the real reason we watch zombie films, or any horror film for that matter. Say what you want negatively about Land, but it had some really neat effects to make up for its shortcomings.

[clanglee]

After all, that is the real reason we watch zombie films, or any horror film for that matter. .

You presume too much sirrah!!:p

Gore and effects are rather far down on my list for "what I look for in a horror film" actually. Top of my list would be . . . well. . .horror. I want the movie to scare me. That can be done easily without big effects. . or hell. . any effects at all. Blair Witch is one of my favorite Horror movies. . . .no effects at all really.

Then comes character, plot, theme, set, acting, etc. Gore and effects are somewhere after all those for me. I like good effects. . .and yes bad effects can distract from the movie a bit. But. . .I dunno. . .I grew up watching movies with bad effects. . so maybe my imagination just kicks in and fills in the blanks so I don't notice bad effects as much. . .or rather don't let them bother me.

[SymphonicX]

If I were going to write a zombie movie set in an old missle silo - that's how I'd end it too... :shifty:

LOL that was genius...!

[Trin]

You presume too much sirrah!!:p

Gore and effects are rather far down on my list for "what I look for in a horror film" actually. Top of my list would be . . . well. . .horror. I want the movie to scare me. That can be done easily without big effects. . or hell. . any effects at all. Blair Witch is one of my favorite Horror movies. . . .no effects at all really.

Then comes character, plot, theme, set, acting, etc. Gore and effects are somewhere after all those for me. I like good effects. . .and yes bad effects can distract from the movie a bit. But. . .I dunno. . .I grew up watching movies with bad effects. . so maybe my imagination just kicks in and fills in the blanks so I don't notice bad effects as much. . .or rather don't let them bother me.
Speak the word brother clang!!

[Skippy911sc]

I think the older I get the more critical I am.

I watch some of the latest movies with such disappointment. I want it all, story, gore, acting!!! I am tired of seeing some of these movies and thinking...this was just slapped together to make a buck. I have yet to see survival but I am not expecting anything at this point. I started to wonder if it was me or the movie makers themselves. I went back and watched the original Day and loved it still. Then I started to wonder if all the directors had lost something...I can hear them saying...don't worry we will fix it with cgi. Blahhh! Think about the greats...Lucas, Spielberg, Romero, Coppola. Everyone of these guys started out great and slowly let me down. On the other hand you have Scorsese who has just been getting better. I don't know what has happened if I am changing (I know I am) or they are getting worse as the years go by (I know they are). I guess it is just a mixture. Rant over!

I want a good movie from our country for a change.

[krakenslayer]

I didn't think the gore in Survival was too bad at all. It was certainly a lot gorier (and also had much bigger action set pieces) than Diary. I can think of only four gore scenes that used intrusive CGI:

MEGA SPOILERS!!




The zombies heads on sticks (apparently real prosthetic heads with faces composited on) - not a terrible effect, IMO
The fire-extinguisher death - very cartoony yes, much moreso than anything else I've seen in the series, but I've seen a lot worse elsewhere... it would have been cooler if he'd stuck the nozzle in its eye socket or something, but the foam going in its mouth and out its ears and eyes was just over the top
The flaregun kill - the flames looked a little too "uniform" and formula-generated
The exploding head at the very start - quite funny, deliberately so, but silly and unrealistic damage considering it was a rifle and not a shotgun



Meanwhile, there were many good practical effects (albeit some with colour-enchanced blood):


Numerous bites with nasty stretching flesh and sinew
A guy having the flesh ripped off his scalp
A guy being ripped open above the pelvis and zombies cramming their hands into his abdominal cavity
A zombie getting a shotgun barrel rammed into its eye and the back of its head blown off
A bitten off finger
A foot pinned to the floor with a pitchfork then ripped off
A zombie being blown up by a landmine, turning it into a cloud of raining meat and red vapour
A very realistic-looking horse being stipped to the bone by a horde of zombies
And probably more I can't think of now


The movie had its problems, but for me, the action and gore just wasn't an issue at all!







SPOILERS ABOVE!!

[acealive1]

diary is worse