Let Sleeping Corpses Lie

[Morto Vivente]

I saw LSCL recently for the first time. The rip-off or homage scenes to NotLD are obvious, but one thing that struck me immediately was the “in your face” anti-pollution commentary within the montage at the beginning. The cause of the dead rising is also linked to mankind messing around with the natural order. I mistakenly thought that the first appearance of environmental issues in the zombie genre was Zombie Creeping Flesh (1980, aka Virus). Let Sleeping Corpses Lie pre-dates ZCF by a number of years, does anyone know if there’s an even earlier appearance of this issue within the genre prior to 1974? Environmental issues seemed to be a theme in the Italian/Spanish zombie productions (also Zombie 3 1988, terrible movie IMO). I thought the zombie eyes special effect was very effective for a budget movie from 1974. sleeping_corpses2.jpg Does anyone know how this was achieved? It doesn't look like contacts, possibly some innocuous chemical ?

[Neil]

Got to me contacts!

[C5NOTLD]

That's a great film. If you are a Romero fan and haven't seen it you really need to. It looks fantastic on bluray (under the title of The Living Dead at Manchester Morgue).

[MoonSylver]

That's a great film. If you are a Romero fan and haven't seen it you really need to. It looks fantastic on bluray (under the title of The Living Dead at Manchester Morgue). +1. While true that it, along with "Children Shouldn't Play With Dead Things" both were an attempt to cash in on NOTLD, neither are very derivitive of it, & are more or less pretty uniquely their "own thing", & occupy an interesting position historically, having been made BEFORE "Dawn" & the flood of imitators that followed it. I think serious fans of the genere owe it to theselves to check it out at least once.

[Morto Vivente]

having been made BEFORE "Dawn" & the flood of imitators that followed it. I think serious fans of the genere owe it to theselves to check it out at least once. Personally I thought the movie made some technical advances on NotLD in terms of the "devouring scenes". Haven't watched Night for quite some time though so I could be talking bollocks. I wonder if Romero watched Sleeping Corpses before writing Dawn?

[Ragnarr]

I saw LSCL recently for the first time. The rip-off or homage scenes to NotLD are obvious, but one thing that struck me immediately was the “in your face” anti-pollution commentary within the montage at the beginning. The cause of the dead rising is also linked to mankind messing around with the natural order. I mistakenly thought that the first appearance of environmental issues in the zombie genre was Zombie Creeping Flesh (1980, aka Virus). Let Sleeping Corpses Lie pre-dates ZCF by a number of years, does anyone know if there’s an even earlier appearance of this issue within the genre prior to 1974? Environmental issues seemed to be a theme in the Italian/Spanish zombie productions (also Zombie 3 1988, terrible movie IMO). I thought the zombie eyes special effect was very effective for a budget movie from 1974. sleeping_corpses2.jpg Does anyone know how this was achieved? It doesn't look like contacts, possibly some innocuous chemical ? Hmm... My eyes looked like that the morning after a few kick ass parties. Maybe they kept the actors up all night drinking beer and eating too many Doritos before filming their scenes.

[Morto Vivente]

Never thought of alcohol and/or severe post bong red-eye. Are Doritos secretly laced with THC?

[C5NOTLD]

+1. While true that it, along with "Children Shouldn't Play With Dead Things" both were an attempt to cash in on NOTLD, neither are very derivitive of it, & are more or less pretty uniquely their "own thing", & occupy an interesting position historically, having been made BEFORE "Dawn" & the flood of imitators that followed it. I think serious fans of the genere owe it to theselves to check it out at least once. That may be but they are certainly heavily influenced by it as indiciated by director Jorge Grau's interview on the Manchester Morgue disc where he praises NOTLD and Romero as the inspiration.

[MoonSylver]

That may be but they are certainly heavily influenced by it as indiciated by director Jorge Grau's interview on the Manchester Morgue disc where he praises NOTLD and Romero as the inspiration. Oh, no doubt. Just making a point that while that is the case they each still managed to bring something fresh to the table in their own way. Neither felt like a direct clone or cheap knockoff.

[shootemindehead]

Laughin me balls off at your signature Moon. Henry P. Funkuncle may be getting an illegal download sometime soon...

[MoonSylver]

Laughin me balls off at your signature Moon. Henry P. Funkuncle may be getting an illegal download sometime soon... I know nothing about the guy, but love that effing picture & album title.

[Morto Vivente]

That's a great film. If you are a Romero fan and haven't seen it you really need to. It looks fantastic on bluray (under the title of The Living Dead at Manchester Morgue). IMO one of the better efforts within the genre. I was pleasantly surprised.

[EvilNed]

Let Sleeping Corpses Lie / The Living Dead at the Manchester Morgue is probably the earliest example of eco-zombiesm. You could lump The Crazies in there, which is from 1973, and I would put it into the same broad genre as zombie films, but their not thematic zombies. However, you do have Garden of the Dead, from '72, which has prisoners getting high on a dangerous supply of experimental formaldehyde and then rising from the grave after they get shot to death during an attempted escape. If you haven't seen it, give it a go. It's on Youtube, and it's a pretty neat little flick.