A Film at 45 - Dawn of the Dead

0:00 Hello everyone, and once again, welcome back to the year nineteen seventy eight. In a Film Buys limited series A Film at forty five. I am David Burns and I'm Scott Hoffman, and attention shoppers. It's time again to dust off the end of a decade that changed cinema forever with a fresh looking modern classics and hidden gems that we can't stop watching even forty five years after their debut. In this episode, we're taking another juicy bite out of the scary side at seventy eight with George A. Romero's quintessential gorefest Dawlin of the Dead. Every dead body that is not exterminated, it becomes one of them.

0:45 It gets up and kills the people it kills, get up and kill What are they doing from kind of instinct memory what they used to do? That's right. There is no more room in hell, and the dead walk the earth, Scott and in too badly Badly. This film is included among the one thousand and one movie you Must See before you die. And as you mentioned, this is from the talented mind of George A. Romero. Yes, indeed, so, Scott, Since you do such a wonderful job.

1:25 How would you describe this movie to someone who has never seen it? When there's no more room left in Hell, the dead walk the earth and head straight to Penny's for the latest small fashions. It's the beginning of a zombie apocalypse in nineteen seventy eight Philly, where we meet an unlikely band of selfish smokers that team up to survive what comes after the Night of the Living Dead. We follow a TV producer, a helicopter pilot, and a buddy cop duo from the local swat team as they aimlessly fly away in a chopper in search of safety. Fate, and a handful of bad decisions brings them to a gigantic mole to fight for their lives. This granddaddy of all zombie movies is a must watch for anyone who's ever been a mall rat or a clerk who loves the smell of commerce in the morning. It's also the movie that answers the question people have been asking for generations if the zombie apocalypse hit while I was at them all, could the combined strength of Orange Julius and Aladdin's Castle helped me survive? Maybe there's there's there's other ways to describe it, but zombie apocalypse in them all? What do you do? That's right?

2:29 No, that was absolutely perfect, Scott, Thank you for that problem. So yeah, whereas Night of the Living Dead was the more, you know, closed intimate look at these zombies, this one takes to a much more epic scale. Right. Oh my god, it's a massive scale. This is a massive undertaking, more than three hundred extras. It's incredible how many different faces, different shots that they did for this, and you know, considering they were each given one dollar in cash, a donut, and a Dawn of the Dead T shirt, which I'm sure they treasure nowadays. But yeah, I mean when you look at just the sheer number of people into this and being able to corral it for this kind of an undertaking, for something that still is so revered, um is amazing. Um. I know this is the follow up to the Night of Living Dead, but Romero wanted to wait a little bit so that he could avoid being stereotyped as a horror director. Um, even though I think that's really where he shines.

3:30 Oh, I mean, looking at his career, especially with Tom Savini, who we're going to get into in a little bit, Yeah, absolutely, it's it's funny. Um. Romero puts a lot of you know, content into his movies, even if they're about zombies. You know, it talks about what's going on in society, uh, you know during those times, and he's he's a master of that. You know, even though these are zombie flicks, you know, there are still meanings behind his movies. And I love this so much. I mean, you see that right away in this movie because it opened up in what the newsroom and you already have like panic ensuing, and people were already arguing with one another, don't know what to do, and they don't trust each others. I mean, you know that speaks volume already what humans would do in a situation like that. Yeah, I mean it starts off with this kind of philosophical debate about what's going on versus fast wording to the sensibilities of today, at least in the pop culture sense. You know, having seen so many of these disaster movies, that's that's the wrong thing to do. It's the wrong time to worry about a TV show unless you're telling people the important information, which they're scrambling to do. Right. But it was just chaos in a newsroom and two of our heroes end up saying like this is ridiculous. We're not getting anywhere ready to get out. We need to go to surviving. Yeah, exactly, which is what you should do. Move on and try to survive in his story, you know. Um, you know, and after that we go into we meet U see that is Roger and Peter right where they are invading

5:02 that apartment complex. Yeah, with the police force, you know, and that that leads into one of the scenes that I thought was really really brutal. Uh you know, when they make it down into the basement of that apartment complex and you see all those people yeah, um, you know, behind the behind the fence, and you know, they end up having people well there's zombies, so I mean they're not alive anymore, so they have to just start shooting them, you know, one by one, you know, as you know, it's probably one of the most gruesome scenes that you would think of. You know, this is nineteen seventy eight, let's not forget so. Um, that was pretty tough to see on screen, something we really don't see much at that time. Yeah, it definitely doesn't pull any punches. Its exactly what kind of movie. This is from the get go. I appreciate the fact that it gets into it so quickly. Oh yeah, um, that it's not you know preamble of you know, what's happening with the virus, and it's just let's go it. It's it's happened, we all understand the idea, let's kind of get into it, um, and that that sequel, it's definitely there are some pretty cringey parts of it, but you know, the level of the level of gore, lets you know kind of what you're in for as you're getting into it. And it also does a great job of kind of dropping a couple of you know, thoughtful ideas, like them asking why all these people were kind of gathered in that one place in that kind of chain link area. Yep, And he mentions, I forget the line specifically, but it's something along the lines of people not being able to let go or kind of understand what's happening.

6:34 So it almost kind of reminds me of The Walking Dead with that barn. Oh yeah, absolutely, and with a heady kind of collected together. But yeah, I mean, if you're sitting there in the nineteen seventy eight theater and you're not ready for this kind of thing, and you could just take the popcorn and go. I wouldn't blame me because it gets pretty raw. Yeah. I think he even had trouble with MPAA, didn't he When he was trying to get this release. They were going to give him like a was it what was it at that time? X rating? I think yeah, yeah, but there was the concern about it being you know, that rating being associated with a different kind of movie, right, Yeah. I think it's one of the things that I think it's we've talked about before, George Mera being creative about you know, editing and doing things to kind of get through them the ratings board, and to get things through without having that kind of stamp that would basically doom it, right Yeah, yeah, absolutely.

7:30 This was the most profitable film of the Dead series. And what I found interesting it was actually banned in Queensland, Australia up until nineteen eighty six. I saw that. As soon as I saw nineteen maybe six, I was like, interesting, yeah, of all years, right yeah, yeah, but yeah, I mean, you know, hats off to Romero and Savini for being that bold and form from making this kind of feature because it is for a very specific type of audience. It is obviously it's not for somebody who's you know, gets queasy easily, but for those who enjoy it, for those who really dive into it, it absolutely opens the door for um for more kind of creative exploration of that kind of stuff it does.

8:15 And you, I know, when we get to the impact part of this, you know that's we're gonna be leaning heavily on what this film has done to the industry. But we'll get to that before we really dive more into the movie. You know, let's talk a little bit about the cast themselves. Um, you know, playing a Stephen was David Minge um. And I'm gonna tell you right now, Scott. I don't know if you saw it, but was that not Hugh Laurie, thank you? Oh my god? Yes, Psychic Network. Um yeah, I couldn't shake that, Like, couldn't you even first scene? I was like, is this like his his grandpa or something like that? Like, um like, and I you know, not to you know, let's not get into the age kind of things. But the it was an eerie kind of um similarity that I saw there, which was which was very interesting. It kind of drew me into his character a little bit more because of that similarity. Yeah, he had some interesting scenes his the shooting scene in the boiler room where he's just recochets are going all over the place, and it's very clever camera edits to get that across. But I'm like, dude, after the first time that happens, stop, stop, we just watched Star Wars a year before. Did you not see that scene? Right? Um, he plays the helicopter pilot, and I would say I would say he was the leader of the group for the most part, wouldn't you. I would say so, yeah,

9:46 because just from the sense of he was the one that had the plan in the first place, right, And this brings up kind of another interesting aspect of this, which I think kind of gave way to things that we see in Walking Dead, where different people respond to the situation in different ways. With him kind of going into the you know, they find the safe spot in the mall, they kind of go behind the scenes into i'll just call it the boiler room, even though that's probably not what it is, but the place where that's the inner workings kind of the heart and the brain to the mall. He instead of kind of running out into the mall like the like his companions do, he sits down and looks at him app and he's looking at different pathways and access sports and also the kind of stuff. So yeah, I would say he's he's definitely the leader of the group, which makes it all the more. I would say it's a little bit of an emotional thing when you see that elevator open. Oh yeah, after he has the turn and he does a great job with that. It's a little weird to see, you know, a Hugh Laurie type zombie, but it is.

10:58 But I mean even George Romero complimented him on his zombie walk as his favorite of all the Dead movies. You know, he even said that, you know, it was in line with worthy of Lon Cheney. So what a compliment that was. Yeah, well, I specifically that turn of the right foot, Yeah, I thought was a nice touch. It's a subtle little thing that he did that that really did well. While we're on the topic of lookalikes, did Peter remind you of Tony Todd? Oh? Yeah, he absolutely did. There there's no doubt about that. I saw a lot of Tony Todd in him as I was watching the movie. Yeah yeah, and he was my favorite character of the Bunch. Yeah. Oh yeah, mine too, played by Ken for you m Yeah, we actually talked to him about in the limited nineteen eighty six series with Jerome at House of Plastic with From Beyond. He played Bubba in that movie, and again, you know, such a great role. I mean, who would you want not on your side in a zombie apocalypse except for Peter, right. I mean he's this tall guy who can easily handle anybody. He's strong. You know, I want him on my side. Yeah. Well, he's very intimidating for the first time you see him in that gas mask and he's towering over the rest of this Yeah. He I think he had a great um arc in this one. Um, you know, going from somebody who's just kind of like, I'm not gonna pull any punches, I'm gonna do what needs to be done, and Um became a I think more of a kind

12:30 of a lieutenant, kind of a leader when he needed to be. And you know even that end scene where he's sitting there and he at least in the addition that I watched UM where he sits there and he thinks about just ending it himself as the zombies are pouring in instead of going on the chopper, and the decides to you know, keep pushing through and go with the with Frand I think it was a great use of hero music at that point. I think that was a little a little funny, but but really cool to see. Yeah, he did a great job. He did. Um. And I find interesting that he would cameo in Zack Snyder's Don in the Dead remake in two thousand and four, where he played the televangelist. Yeah, so really neat that they brought him back. Yeah, and I'm surprised that he's been so popular. He just does a great job and everything that he does. I mean, he has a huge list of credits. Did you look at his And he's got a lot of B type films that you know, we all love in a door, so, you know, very busy guy for sure. Well I heard at least at one point there is the whole festival dedicated to him, the foy Fest. That's awesome, and it was just the Yeah I would that's awesome. Yeah for sure. Um.

13:41 So the next one is Scott Runner as Roger Um, who to me was really the goofball of the group. Um, you know you run away. See he's the type of person who's probably going to get himself into trouble and sure not, he's the first one as a group who ends up getting bits right right. And I mean, for this one, I think it is smart to add that kind of character, even though he's a bit of a dufus, somebody who's a bit of a loose cannon. And you know, notes that would come up later and things like Walking Dead the Sometimes the trouble is not the zombies, it's other people. And it did make me think a couple of times because the pace of this movie does run fairly slow.

14:22 At some points, it does there are some downbeats. It's not all you know, bites and running and screaming and shooting. There are times when they have to kind of sit and reflect. It's interesting to see their their nest kind of evolve for the you know, the home base where the here is going to set up into more of kind of a home life. And you see them kind of pretending, and you see Fran kind of push away Steven's ring and say like it won't be real. Yeah, And then when when Roger starts to turn. You see Peter having a hard time with it. So you see those notes of people like so what do we do? Like this is safe for now, but how can it be forever? How can we know what's going on outside? And how much is this really going to sustain? Um, So having somebody like Roderian there that's a bit of a an X factor was definitely necessary. Um it was four guy was a bit of an idiot at times. Um. I mean he lost his assault rifle just getting into a pennies Come on, man, and then that's that's Umbie ended up carrying it the entire time the wrong way. Um. That was a that was a nice touch. But I think it's funny too that they they talk about when Scott slid down the escalator that they blame him for to today that I guess apparently a lot of people were doing that, yes, and so like now they got those like bars and stuff at the bottom, so you can't get away with it. So like they were talking about, oh, it was our fault that that happened. Yeah, yeah,

15:52 that's so cool. Yeah that he thinks that. I saw a quote where George was asked, you think that's because of us. I'd love to say it's because of Dawn of the Dead. Selvini replied, so absolutely cool. We'll say it is because I think that's a nice touch. Yeah, it's Dawn of the Dead's fault that we that that happened, So good deal. I would be surprised if somebody out there doesn't take um uh rogers face, you know that that I kind of kind of look of his zombie turn from the poster, right, Just take a little circle of that and put it on those little stubs, even if it's Halloween time. Make them easy to take off. Don't be church of the people that you know, take care of the escalators. But yeah, no, that was fantastic and the use of escalators in other ways. Um, it made me think those zombies are back on the freaking escalators, like they're just sitting there like with these these weird faces, just kind of looking around like it's very much this whole like you know, um, this days of commerce um that they're in, just kind of walking around like they have no idea what's going on. I feel like it was definitely am an aimless type of zombie, not like a ravenous kind of angry running at your zombie just very much like you were saying before, it's kind of poking at commerce, right and people just kind of blindly walking around and kind of losing themselves. Yeah. Absolutely, And um,

17:23 but before we get into well, we'll talk it. One thing I want to talk about about some running zombies that are in this movie that isn't typical for a George Romero film. But we'll get in done just a little bit. So to round out our cast, we have Galen Ross who who plays Francine. So what I really like about her character is that she's not your typical damsel in distress right now. She wants to learn how to take care of herself. She wants to know how to use that gun, she wants to know how to fly that helicopter. And I have so much respecting it. Apparently a lot of that too, camp comes from the truth. Galen Ross. You know, she talked about she really wanted herself to come off, you know, as a strong character and not that typical. As I said, damn's all in distress. Um, But I mean that's that's intelligent and that's what I really liked about her character. Um, she didn't want to just sit around. She wanted to be a part of it. And you know, if that happened to us, would you not want everybody in the group to be able to a handle a gun and b know how to fly the helicopter in case you had to get out of there everybody because you don't know what's going to happen. Yeah, yeah, for sure. But it's Um, it's very interesting to look on uh Steven's face when she starts to talk about that, because he's constantly talked about as fly guy. So then it's like, okay, but if everybody knows, do I become expendable?

18:44 Right? Right? Yep? You see that kind of like glint in his head when he's when he's hearing about that. Um. But no, it's absolutely a smart idea. Sure it was. Yeah. I loved hearing some of the behind the scenes notes about Galen Ross so um apparently on George told her to scream at one point. She made that point around like, no, this is a strong character. Let her be a strong character, and he respected that and didn't ask her anymore. I think she did a great job of showing somebody who was kind of progressing again through kind of an arc because she's she's trying to keep things together in the news studio. She's she's going along with with Steven's playing in the helicopter, helping them to kind of, you know, make decisions as they go through. And then m that moment when she starts to feel a little bit of panic and thinking about the future. Point she reveals that she's pregnant. Ye, which I thought was very well done. It was brought back in the Dawn of the Dead remake. But hey, yeah, exactly, horrifying way, Yeah, that's okay, let's not think about that. Yeah, that's not no, please, let's move on. But no, she she uh, she did a great job of showing that kind of emotional range of somebody who's in that situation.

20:00 Um, I would like to you know, a couple of things that I don't necessarily agree with her character's decisions. One is trying to scare a zombie away with flares, which I realized that this you know, looking back, she wasn't left with a gun, so she didn't really have anything else. But it's, you know, something that could possibly have burned down the entire mall, so maybe not the best thing to do. And just that I know that Dia Wallace, the World's Best movie Mom would not approve of smoking and drinking while she pregnant. Nope, I know it's a stressful time, but yeah, yeah, no, I agree. Um so, but you know, moving on with the movie. So, I mean, obviously we talked about the cast, but you can't forget to talk about the man, the legend himself, George A. Romero um who is the father of zombies. Am I correct in saying that, Yeah, I would say he gets that credit. Yeah, for sure, So you know we have a lot to thank him for that. But I mean, if you know films, you know horror films, you know this man's name and respect that it brings. You know, he began making movies at the age of fourteen.

21:14 He attended Carnegie Mellon Institute for Art Theater Design in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. So of a local todlus Scott, you know, I know we're here in Ohio, but hey, Pittsburgh's not that far over drive. Prior to Night of the Living Dead, which I did not know this until I started digging into information about him, he actually did like small promotional featurettes and one of his assignments was to shoot short films that were used in television series Mister Rogers Neighborhood in nineteen sixty eight. That is fantastic, complete opposite of what he became after that, right, But hey, you got to start somewhere, right. So he talks about his influence as a lot universal horror classics, which I can't fault him for that. His favorite horror film as a kid was The Thing from Another World in nineteen fifty one, which I can respect that as well, because we already talked about a couple of remakes, you know, one being in Invasion of the Body Snapchers, and we talked about in eighty six Invaders from Ours that came from the fifties. So I respect that he talks about he loved Orson Welles and Howard Hawks were his favorite over Alfred Hitcock. That's huge because Alfred Hscock is a genius in himself. Yep.

22:30 But apparently he got his idea for Dawn of the Dead. He visited a friend when they were opening the Monroeville mall and they were walking around and stuff like, and his friend made a note that this would be a perfect place to hold up in in case of an emergency, which basically planned the seed in Romero's head about hey, that would make a good idea, and thus started the Dawn of the Dead that he would make and that we would love today. Yeah, and I mean, I think we're probably not the only ones who have worked in them all that have seen the kind of the you know, the inner workings, even like little passageways behind the scenes and all of sud the kind of stuff that's made us think about the same kind of thing. Because we grew up in a decade with action movies and movies that we're inspired by this one that kind of led us to think, like, what would we do in those kind of situations? So it was a as a a pivotal moment in movie history, I would say, oh, yeah, absolutely. And another respect I have for mister Romero is the fact that he didn't use storyboards. You know, I am nobody with saying that I'm the same as Romeo, because I'm not. But with the little projects that I work on, I just write a shot list and that's what I go off of me and apparently that's what Ramero did too, and I did not know that, So that gives me a much more respect for that man.

23:48 Yeah, you know, yeah, and of course we can't we can't forget about talking about Dario Argentino. Yeah, you know, he's the man who basically came in to help finance this project. And you know, if you don't know who that is, definitely take him. Take a look on imdbef under his name. He's done a lot of horror stuff from Italy. He actually invited Romero to come over to Rome and write this, which he did. He wrote this in three weeks and had the complete busting of Art Argentino. Isn't that cool? Yeah? Yeah, I'm glad they were able to pair up and and get this movie done together. It's it's astonishing when you look at the scale and the scope of what they were able to do, and knowing they were working without storyboards, knowing it was born out of just a fairly straightforward idea. There's a lot of complexity that they bake into it, and what they were able to get done and the time they were able to get done is astonishing. Yeah. I loved hearing about them. The fact that Romero would film a lot of extra shots so that when in editing, it could actually use all these different angles and things like that to kind of assemble and make it seem like there's more people than there actually are, because I mean, I know that it's fairly easy to keep track of like the Screwdriver zombie, the nun Zombie, the Nurse zombie, but it makes it seem it multiplies that cast of three hundred extras um. That's a very clever idea. Yeah, it absolutely is. And I believe he see made

25:22 a small cameo in this movie too. I think he played like the old nick they like the Cineclaus Spiker in the raid there towards the real Yeah, very brief. It was a very brief. But Romero does make it a little appearance in this movie. And again, and we've talked about that before. I love it when directors do stuff like that. Yep. So you know, moving on to talk about the movie, let's talk a little bit about another guy who obviously had a huge impact on the industry, and that is none other than Tom Savini. Yeah. I was gonna say, you better be talking about Tom Savini. You know, I know what I'm going to get your back. Yeah, this guy is the Sultan of splatter. He is the granddaddy of horror effects. UM, and we have tremendous respect for what he's been able to do over his career. So when I was looking into Tom, there's there's so much more that we could probably do a whole episode specifically about Tom Savina if we wants, but some of the highlights, you know, thinking about the fact that he was actually given the chance to work in the first film with Romero and I was living dead. Um he got drafted into the Vietnam War as a combat photographer, I believe UM.

26:36 And so leading up to Dawn of the Dead, UM he he had another couple of UM some other credits in his in his in his belt, he had used some of his experiences in Vietnam unfortunately, had Um kind of given him some UM, some ideas for how to kind of explore that. And thinking about the horrific things that he had to see there is staggering. But using that in a way for to help guide kind of the sensibilities of how he would approach some of those things is very interesting. And knowing what he was able to do with it that the creativity that he has is unmistakable.

27:30 And one of the interesting things about kind of teeming back up for Dawn of the Dead with Romero and getting a chance to kind of have his major debut with Dawn. I had seen in an interview with the Pittsburgh City Paper that he remembered getting a telegraph from Romero saying, we've got another gig. Start thinking of ways to kill people. So he said, I came back to Pittsburgh and I'm thinking things like, how about we drive a screwdriver through his zombie's ear. George loved it, So I'm building retractable screwdrivers. He went on to stay in the interview. I wouldn't have a career if not for this movie. If there was no Dawn, there would be no Friday the thirteenth for me. And when you look at them, the impact that he's had on cinema since then, it's hard to imagine a world without him, or without having this start, with so many extras, with so many scenes, being able to experiment in so many different ways, the helicapter, Frankenstein Zombie, the screwdriver zombie, the kind of strange blood pressure cuff scene which I was like, what are you doing? Why are you taking your blood pressure in the middle of all this, But a clever way to experiment with a lot of that kind of stuff, and the fact that he's not afraid to jump right into it, knowing that Tom Cruise doesn't do makeup.

28:59 I heard that Tom is the only man in Hollywood who can claim all four titles of a stunt man, makeup artist, actor, and director and recently one person that comes close and it's his Idol Longini. Yeah. Tom Sumini is is the type of person a filmmaker who is always on a small budget that they look for because the dude will do anything you wanted to do. You know, he's very talented with you know and doing the special effects and stuff like that, but you know he's willing to sacrifice his body by doing stunts and stuff like that. He even did that in Front of the Thirteenth, you know, a very low budget film. You know, he was there from day one to the last day, and you know he did some of the stunts in that movie. So that is the kind of guy you went around on your film set. Yeah, although I definitely felt the impact in the scene he does in this one where he jumps over the balcony, oh and apparently missed the crash mat by a little bit. And ended up hurting his back. Yeah, I had to ride around on a golf cart like oh man, but yeah, and he had he had a big job ahead of him. He had a crew of eight people helping him apply all the gray makeup to the extras, and they would all kind of wait around in the brown derby inside the mall and occasionally get drunk apparently of course.

30:12 But there's a lot of times when you think about this is still an active mall where they were doing all these kinds of things. So when you see like the biker gang scenes, when you see all the effects that they have to pull off and then clean up and get the mall ready for use the next day, that's astounding. Yeah, because there's a lot of mayhem in this mall. There really is a lot. I think they had to shut down for the holidays, right, Yeah, because the moll need to decorate for Christmas and stuff like that. They obviously couldn't have that for the film. They had to shut down filming for a little bit until the holiday has gone over with soday. You probably wouldn't do that anymore. You build your own set. But still that's awesome, right exactly. Yeah, they couldn't show blood splatters on Santa Claus that very well, lots of questions there.

31:02 Yeah, absolutely, but no, I'm Tom Savini genius for sure, huge impact on the film industry. Yeah, absolutely, yep. So one of the things I wanted to come back to was I mentioned earlier that there was a couple of zombies that run in this film that you don't see in a Romero film ever, because his zombies always are slow walking. So yeah, when that when those two zombie kids come barreling out of that door at Peter um, you know, they're running full speed at him, and you don't typically see that in a Romero film. But what I find interesting is those two kids where the nieces and nephews of Tom Savini. Yeah, I mean, come on, like, if your uncle is a makeup artist, is a is a special effects genius like Tom Savini, yep, and he's like, hey, come to the set, we'll play at Like, dude, you'd be on top of the world as a kid to be able to play and do something like that, wouldn't you. Absolutely, Yeah, I know I would. But apparently so yeah, but apparently Peter wasn't expecting that either or the actor ken Forest. It wasn't expecting that for them to come out of there like that, so it was kind of a surprise to which is a good call. Like, you know, in this kind of movie, you're not expecting to see kid zombies. No, that's kind of a place like, oh, do we really want to go there? Right? So yeah, a great choice to keep that a surprise and get that genuine shock of what's going on with him. It absolutely was. And George Romero's wife makes an appearance in this movie as a voice. Oh yeah, isn't she one of the announcers in the ball She is? Which I found really cool too that he fipped it in. I do question their decision to turn all

32:37 that stuff on, though I know they were just kind of goofing around or what that, But why would you turn on all that noise? Yeah don't I don't know. But here's the funny thing, Scott, And you know, I was going to mention this when we get to the new the score, but it's like, was that music coming from the speakers that was playing, because some of that was some of the goofiest music I've ever heard? Was that actual mom music? Or was that the score of the film. I I don't know. I don't either. That's that's a way back machine question for the seventy eight mall Walkers. Um, what was the name of that one song, that kind of polka song? Yeah, I don't think they were playing that so crazy it was. And yeah, when when listening to the songs and the sounds that they were playing, and there were a few that, um uh they got my attention. Um specifically the warbling sound around that theme song that we hear in Seaun of the Dead right, that took me right back to that and I was like, Sun of the Dead, I love that movie. Yep, it's sure, dude, But no, I mean it was. It was still very interesting score, which, since we're talking about it, apparently Dario Argentino had some of that did some of that score. I did not know that interesting. Yeah, apparently that man has a mini mini talents too, not just in producing and directing, but he can also do music too, Scott interesting. Yeah, And the rest of it was done with this with a group called Goblin, an Italian

34:09 band, were weren't they? Yeah? Yeah, yeah, I don't know anything about them, but yeah, it's definitely a different style of music that I'm used to when it comes to horror movies, but it was still fitting. Yeah, I can I can see them being some there being maybe a Goblin cover band or two at Living Dead Weekend that they hold every year in in the Monroeville Mall. We'll talk about that in a little bit. Yeah, I'm go ahead and talk about it now. I mean, you know this was filmed in Monroeville, Pennsylvania at the Monroe of the Mall. I believe people still go visit that place, right, Yeah, every year there's Living Dead Weekend, so, um, it's a this year fans have a chance to celebrate the forty fifth anniversary, obviously with members of the casting crew.

34:54 Um. I looked up the listing. I didn't know this thing existed, but apparently they have these big events at the mull itself. There's a zombie museum where you can see a lot of a lot of paraphernalia and things related to the movie. Obviously, you can be in the place where this whole took this whole thing took place. A lot of the main cast and the favorite zombies will be there along with the legendary Tom Savini. That's awesome. So if you're interested this year, it's June ninth, eleventh, twenty twenty three. Tickets are available at the Living Dead Weekend dot com. M I see a road trip in my future, Scot, I think so. Yeah, that sounds like a blast of a trip for sure. All right, So, did you find out any interesting quotes from anybody in this movie?

35:42 Yeah? A lot of what I found was was focused on Tom Savini because I think um special effects and that whole um, that whole aspect of movies in general, I think is one of the most fascinating in the world. It's always been interesting to me. So there's an interview on Roger eber dot Com where Saviney was reflecting on the art of illusion in film. He said, I have a book out called Grand Illusions that's all about the makeup effects I've done in my movies. I think of them as magic tricks. Now, some directors don't how to create a magic trick. There's misdirection, like let's take this axe and make it take a chunk out of the wall, or knock out a light bulb, and with a relax before the rubber one comes in and them beds into a girl's head like in front of the thirteenth. That's a magic trick. The angle is critical as far as creating a magic trick at special effects solutions. This is what I tell my students in school. I have a makeup and special effects school in Pittsburgh that I've had for eighteen years. My students have worked on Name Emotion Picture in the last fifteen years, and my students have worked on them or math companies, toy companies, labs. The mindset I tell them to have is what do I need to make me believe that what I'm seeing is really happening? And then you show that to the audience. He went on to kind of say talking about his involvement in direction, even when he's not directing the film, being able to step in with the director and set up shots in a certain

37:13 way to make those effects come through. You create the pieces to make what you're seeing. It's exactly what a magician does. A magician makes you look up here and he's pulling flowers out of his butt. He's misdirected you. There's a lot of mechanical devices to pull that off. So I would say most directors, not all of them. There are some directors who are really in tune with the effects being magic. There were only a few contracts where he insisted that I direct a scene with my effects man because I'm creating a magic trick. If they'd led it toward it the best way possible, then they have to do it the way I had viget it. I surely don't want to interfere with the director's vision of things. Most of the time. I think all the time the effects fit right into what the director wants, and that's to fool the people into thinking what you're seeing is really happening.

37:54 Nice. So that's a lot to say, but I love hearing what he his opinion on this kind of thing. A is a clever way to think about it. It's not somebody who steps in and makes something happen. It's somebody who really orchestrates the illusion of the scene and pulls it off in an epic way. Yeah, that's really interesting, And I love hearing from these artists when they quote about stuff from movies, especially the older things, because you don't get to hear a lot about that stuff anymore. So Savini was actually talking about you know, modern films today, you know, using CGI and stuff like that with, you know, in a remake of like Donna the Dead, you could put like three thousand zombies into one scene where Romero you know, said, I don't want to use it, to rely on it. Talking about CGI obviously, he says, but I guess I am old fashioned guy. Give me a rubber suit, you know. Yeah, but um to going further with that, you know, Romero says, you know, talking about the industry itself. He says, if I fail, they write me off as another statistic. If I succeed, they pay me a million bucks to fly out of Hollywood and fart. I love Narrow.

39:08 I swear he's got so much humor, and he does. He brings that great style to his movies. So yeah, yeah, he takes what he does very seriously, but he doesn't take himself too seriously. Exactly. Just a breath fresh air, it sure sure is so? Um any any what ifs? I kind of trying to dig in to see if there was anyone else that was going to be castoring something like that, but I didn't find anything. The only thing that I found was the alternate ending that they were talking about, where um Peter commits suicide and Franz sticks her head in the blades of the helicopter. Yeah, which apparently was kind of foreshadowed by the helicopter Frankenstein Zombie, which would have definitely been shocking. But I think it's a better decision to not have the movie end that way, agree, because I think it's a little bit more of an I mean, it's definitely an ending when your two heroes die, but it adds a little bit of that interesting what if seeing them fly away, because I think as an audience you're able to kind of fill in the gaps and maybe talk about it afterward, to say where did they end up going? Did they find an island that they have enough fuel to just get to another mole or find another refuge?

40:22 And I think it's that kind of thinking that again leads to things like Walking Dead, where you just have so many different scenarios that can play out in this kind of situation. All Right, Dave, let's take a short break and when we get back, we'll get into the rewind. Now, Jeff, you know I love my extras and my bonus features. Now, are you ready to offer some to our listeners? Absolutely, Brad. That's why we've launched via film by Patreon. Starting for as little as three dollars, you can become a production assistant to receive a film by merchandise and gain access to our exclusive content. That's right. Each month, we'll be offering up everything from episodes about our favorite actors to audio commentaries of our favorite and not so favorite movies. And for you fans of the familiar, we've got a nice surprise, right Jeff, that's right, brad Our Patreon is the only place you'll get access to the lost nineteen eighty six episodes. We're covering twenty more movies from nineteen eighty six, and we've got some of our favorite guests joining in. Now you mentioned merchandise stickers, t shirts, our new color changing stadium cups exclusive to the Patreon, So join today and get in on all the great bonus content. Welcome to the All Eighties Movies Podcast. I'm Bill and I'm Jason, and this is the podcast where we talk about the

41:53 blockbusters, the flaps, and everything in between from one of the freshest decades for movies, the nineteen eighties. So whether you're a brain, a jock, a valley girl, or a Jedi, we've got some Eighties classics for you to these movies stand the test of time. Are we discovering something new? Is there an eighties movie we are finally watching for the first time. Join us each week as we dive into the cinematic nostalgia that inspired and influenced a generation, from the hits to the cult classics. We'll discuss our earliest memories, favorite scenes, fun facts, and are not so favorite movie moments too. You can find me All Eighties Movies podcast wherever you listen to your podcast. Please subscribe and happy listening. So let's rewind. Let's talk a little bit about some of our favorite scenes and maybe some fun questions that we have. What any favorite scenes got well to the count of mind that we haven't mentioned yet. One is the eyepatch Scientist. Oh yeah, he's he's got such a great delivery and the scene where he just kind of um seems to go into a loop and he's just talking about logic, logic, logic.

43:13 It's one of the few times when we kind of step out of the mole and look back at the world and what's happening outside of it. I think he does a great job. The other scene that I just thought was hilarious was our introduction just Tom Savini's character Blades, the leader of the motorcycle gang, and the first scene when he's like, yeah, let's go get him. So he opens up a switch blade and it's like comb that he is. The comb is a mustache, and I'm like, really, man, like you've got that there, all right? I mean what if he's like in the middle of a fight and he's like hey man and he hits the switchblade and comb comes out and he's like comb a mustache and I'll get right to you right there. Second, Ramea definitely injected a little bit more humor into this one than he did with Night of the Living Dead. There's there's no doubt about that. Yeah, yeah, you know what about you?

44:07 So my favorite scene is a little bit more serious. Uh it's when um, Roger turns into a zombie and uh Peter has to do be the one, uh you know to obviously you know, you know, take him out. Um. I really love that scene because you know, you got all these zombies throughout the movie that you you know, obviously a lot of work went into making them look like zombies, but a lot of them aren't as detailed as Rogers is when he turns into a zombie. Um, you know, because we get that really close up shot on his face, you know, when he's completely turned. Yeah, and I really like that scene because you know, you have to see Peter struggle, uh and take out his friend, because I mean, you put yourself in that situation. You know, if if you were into zombie Apocalypse and you know, you've been friends with somebody for years and years and they get bit and they get turned in his and you have to be the one that shoots them. You know, you talk about this earlier. You know, are they still them or are they a zombie? Now we know they're a zombie, but I mean you're still going to have that running through your head, you know, and you're going to struggle with that, and unfortunately, you know it's either you or them and they're already turned. You got to make that hard decision and you really see that struggle with Peter, and I really I really like that that scene for sure. Yeah, well, I think they did a smart They made a smart decision by drawing that time out and having him sit there and kind of watching him from the other room and kind of talking him down and talking him through the situation. That does remind me kind of an interesting

45:37 point. I don't think anywhere in the movie they talk about if you're bitten, then you turn. I want to see if they mentioned somewhere. I thought they talk a lot about you know, that guy in the newsroom says they kill and the people they that they kill get up and they kill and things like that, But I don't remember a lot of mention of you know, don't get bitten because if you are, and you'll turn. It almost seemed like they were saying because if the it was a little it felt a little vague to me, like there's the lady that gets shot on top of Roger and he's covered in her blood and everything else. So at that point it's kind of like, is that is that infecting him? Is that doing what's going on? M Is it all the bites or is it just um if somebody dies then they get back up? Like I don't I don't remember there being a lot to mention of a viral kind of might have been aspect to it. But it's interesting because there was no discussion about like, well, he's been bitten, he's going to turn, let's put him down they were trying to do a lot of things to help take care of him, give him injections, give him care, all this other kind of stuff.

46:45 Um. But yeah, it's a great scene. It's really iconic too, because I remember just seeing that face on so many boysters and advertisements for it. Um. It's a great choice to include that scene because definitely when I when I first saw this, um, I see in the face of his zombie turn first. So then when I saw him as a you know, as a normal person in the beginning of the movie, he was like, Oh, he's it, He's gonna turn and you know it. But it doesn't matter. It's still a very interesting ark to follow. It was very impactful for sure. And speaking of impactful, Oh want hold on, let's back up a little bit. Let's ask him some fun questions. So, Scott, what do you got funny? Yeah, So, in terms of what if, I don't have alternate casting, but I'd like to know, since we used to work in them all together, if you're trapped in a ball, what's your plan? Well, I'm going to do. The first thing that they did is make sure I close off all the entrances and then and then take out any zombies that are in there, because you want to clear it out and make sure go room by room, store by store and Scott, you know we when we used to take out trash from Suncoast, Remember those long winding hallways and the bad get lost in Yes, yeah, the bat cave, yeah, you know those are really creepy in themselves.

47:58 So clearly going through all those areas too, and making sure you cleared out all the zombies so that you know you and your friends are safe should be high priority. I would think, yeah, And you know, I think it was a smart decision that you. Eventually you saw that plans start to come together for them, you know when they parked the trucks in front to say like, well they can't get enough pressure because they have to squeeze in between the truck, right. Very smart, but yeah, yeah, I think that's absolutely one of the first things you do. It was kind of interesting that they had they had set up camp and that kind of nest that they had behind the scenes upstairs. Eventually they brought furniture up. But that's one of the first things that I was thinking of, was wouldn't you try to set up camp in a place like Macy's where you've got like beds, linens, appliances. Yeah, a little mini house. Make that your home base. Although it's got so many entrances. I think that's the thing.

48:46 You want to make sure you're closed off so you can sleep and not worry about being approached by a zombie because you're in a closed room. I think that's why they did that, Yeah, which makes sense. But I love the fact that they were like painting walls and all that stuff to you know, really give that you know that home field that you know, this is where we live now, so we got to make sure we take care of it. I thought that was a cool touchtoo, right, Yeah, I mean even like looking at the intricate behind the scenes of the ma all you never know or even there, Like when I started working there, I had been visiting them all for so long, but then I saw these little batcave entrances. I was like, oh, yeah, all these like catacombs and stuff like this. This is really cool. So yeah, I can't see why Romeo was drawn to it. I think we had been in trouble though, because you know, we didn't have a grocery store attached to our mall.

49:30 We didn't have a gun store attached to our mall, So I mean, I mean, yeah, you have the food court where until they run you run out of food there, But I mean what would you do for food supply at the mall we worked at Scott right, Well, I definitely wouldn't do what our heroes do, which is to start putting bodies in the freezer with no food. What are you doing? Like, then you gotta start making a plan of like, all right, what food's going to go bad first? What's all the milk based product we have to do? And all this other kind of stuff. Yeah, exactly, Yeah, you absolutely want to be near the sporting goods store and the food court. That would be part of my plan. I'm sure that our plan would probably start at Suncoast because it always would. But yeah, you got to take advantage of those batcave tunnels that lead out to the compactors for sure, and secure the stores that you know that you need. Don't worry about like forever twenty one or whatever, like not disparaging that if if that's what you you know you need to survive, that's cool. But no, fashion, I don't know, not so much. No need otherwise I'd just say, you know, my plan would be take the car, go to Mum's, kill Phil, grab Liz, go to the Winchester, have a nice cool plant, and wait for all this to blow over like that. Nice. Yeah, that's a good plan. Now another follow up question, speaking of people that work on them all, what would Jeff do Jeff of Sun Coast Days, Oh, man, I don't know. I mean, you know, he's um, he probably do something similar what we're gonna do, you know, making sure that everything is closed off and we're taking care of He would have a

51:04 blash running around killing all the zombies. Yeah, I definitely see that he's going to take charge of that for sure. Um. But food wise, you know, you know he's not gonna go after he need the vegetables so that Scott say, we can sacrifice those. If you guys need that, that's fine. I'll be over here, right, you get the plane, hamburgers and exactly. Yeah, so I think that's what he would be doing. Yep, he'd want to secure great steak and potato and probably Dollar Tree, the pretzel the pretzel place. Yes, absolutely, range Julius. Maybe make sure he's got enough re fills exactly yep, yep. No, he'd probably be uh, he'd get very serious and he'd take that leadership role. He would like that thing. He'd be like, Okay, this is what we need to do. Let's not mess around with this, right, good things to Yep? All right? Any other questions, Um no, no, all right. So let's move on to the impact of this film.

52:00 Scott. We've already mentioned a few things here and there about this, but one of the things that I definitely want to talk about, and that I had mentioned earlier, is George Romero's way of putting what is going on with society into his movies, especially his zombie movies. You know, I believe Night of the Living Dead was really a metaphor for the horrors of racism, you know, that that he would put into that film, whereas Don and the Dead tackles consumerism. You know, I mean when you see this movie and they talk about it a couple of times that the dead are flocking to the mall because that's what they love to do, that's their memory, and that's why they're going there. What does that tell you about the people you know in today's society? And then too, you know, and you see it with a lot of the bikers and stuff. What's their first reaction when they get into that mall. They're going after the jewelry, They're going after the money. What do you need that for? Right? You don't need that. You're trying to survive. You're trying to live. The only thing you should be going after is food, weapons, and a place to stay and bottle up so that nothing can get you and make sure you're surrounded by good friends that can protect each other, you know. And that's what I love about Rameiro. I mean how he just pulls it into the film and you don't realize it until you really start thinking about It's like, oh wow, that is really neat. How he just brought that into and you don't realize it. That's so cool, right, Well, and subtle things like medical supplies, right yeah, And it's it's it's little scenes that touch on

53:34 it and get you thinking about this in different ways and make this so much more than just a big gorifest you know. I think that was very smart. Um. And yeah, when he's when he's kind of poking at consumerism and showing how many people are drawn to it, that it almost seems to be like you know, moss to a flame, Like, there's so many people that their their lives kind of center around that and with different occupation. I know that was probably a bit of fun to kind of dress people up in different costumes representing different walks of life and whatever. But it also a little bit makes you think about, you know, a nurse that turns in a hospital, what would happen people in so many of these different situations, and what would be happening outside of the mall. As much as he makes it seem like a very isolated place, I think that's a great way of kind of bringing the rest of the world into it and making you think about not only life after, but the world beyond. Right absolutely, And you know, another huge impact of this movie, and you know you went into great detail of that, is the master Tom Sadini. Yeah, what he brought to this movie and what he would bring to future movies and in movies that would have a huge impact on the film Aage Yourself, you know, Donna the Dead and then just what a couple years later he was gonna be doing Friday the Thirteenth, and with the school that he would create to help other people learn makeup and special effects and gore and all of that stuff,

55:06 and to let them go out and do their own thing. It just it amazes me on what he just him alone the impact had on the industry. Yeah, and I think that's a I think that's a great point to make, the fact that he's kind of carrying that tradition on his impact on practical effects and being creative with that. Like I said, with the retractable screwdriver, having to think in the moment, having to think with the materials that you have and the technology available in nineteen seventy eight definitely had an impact and made a lot of these other movies that followed, not only in this the Dead kind of franchise, but beyond that made so much of what we grew up with in the eighties possible. Right, absolutely, Well, Scott, where did you see this movie? Yet? The only way that I was able to see this movie was not on streaming because I could not find it on any streaming service whatsoever. I didn't give myself enough time to buy it on DVD, but I was lucky enough to find a local library. Again, I saw the US theatrical version. I know that there are several cuts of this available. But that's the one that I got a hold of.

56:14 What about you? So you know I don't have this in my collection. Yes, I am ashined of that, and I'm going to remedy that when they rerelease it. I want to have this in my collection. And I kind of scrambled because I'm like, oh man, this isn't showing anywhere. Oh I actually got lucky. Somebody uploaded the entire movie in tin adp on YouTube, and so I was able to just watch it straight from YouTube, the whole movie streaming on my PlayStation and just watched it. So and it's it was a beautiful copy of it. So but definitely, if it comes out, get a physical copy of this and put it in your collection, because it is, it belongs there. Yeah. I tell you what, if you're a fan, go ahead and get a ticket to go to the Living Dead weekend June ninth through eleventh. I'm sure that you're going to be able to secure a copy there, and you're probably going to have your choice of different editions and all this other kind of stuff. So yeah, if I'm going to get it, that's going to be my kind of pilgrimage to get that one. Nice nice. All right, Well, I would like to thank all of our listeners for tuning in and listening to what we have to say about movies from nineteen seventy eight. If you would like to leave a comment on what you would do if there was a zombie apocalypse, please do so. I know Scott and I would appreciate that, and everybody to John Buy would enjoy to see what you have to say. Yep, exactly, So Scott, what's up next? Well? What's coming up? This Thursday? On April thirteenth, a film by joined several popular podcasts for a special episode to celebrate the seventieth anniversary of James Bond. Then, on Friday,

57:46 Jeff and Brad will Talk will be on the All Eighties podcast to talk about Van Dam's nineteen eighty eight classic Blood Sport. Nice speaking of blood. When we return, continuing our scarefest, composer and horror model Chad Cochrane joining us to discuss Halloween, which to me is that is the scary movie of nineteen seventy eight. I can't wait to explore that movie with you, guys. Halloween. I'm gonna go spoiler alert. Halloween is my favorite horror franchise. So I cannot wait to talk about John Carpenter's Halloween, cannot wait fantastic, can wait to talk about with you? All right, So, if you want to leave a comment again what would you do in a zombie apocalypse?

58:29 Discuss what's next or even half suggestions, you can find us at www dot film by podcast at dot com, a film by podcast at gmail dot com, a filmed by a podcast on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. Until our film reels start rolling again, go out watch something new, watch something different, and who knows look you will discover next. Thanks everyone, Thanks, back to you next time