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Night of the Living Dead (1968

Night of the Living Dead (1968

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Rating: 3 stars
Summary: Dont Buy Old Copies
Review: I spent my entire life from the age of six hearing great things about this movie. Things like 'Dont watch this movie alone' and 'This is one of the best horror films ever made,'so as you can imagine I took the first chance I could to buy it when I saw a colour version for £4 at a market stall. I just couldn't wait to go home and put it into my VCR. As soon as the film started it hit me that I didnt have a clue what anyone was saying. By the end of the film I was ready to go to sleep. The zombies were just random people with a bit of face paint on and weren't scary at all, but then again what were they to for special effects back then. I just thaught never mind and put it away to the back of my video collection. A couple of years later while being really bored in the school holidays I decided to play it again. This time it was later on at night, so I drew the curtains and turned all of the lights off (its the only way to watch this film really). This time around I found it a little less boring. I refrained myself from falling asleep listening to the ramblings and bad acting and found that this time around I enjoyed it a lot more and in the dark the atmosphere seemed to grow on me. I started to undestand then why it was considered to be a 'great' horror movie. These days I would not call it that though seeing as I am a victim of modern standards addicted to million dollar special effects and computer generated images but for any collector of classic horror its a must. My advice would be to pick up a more recent copy like the 30th anniversary addition as hopefully the sound and picture have been tweaked slightly so to erase that feeling of 'what the hell is going on'. If any horror film (or any film) fans want to E-Mail me and talk im at ...

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: GEORGE A. ROMERO'S NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD
Review: NO THIS IS NOT THE 30TH ANNIVERSARY LIMITED EDITION THIS IS THE REAL MOVIE THE ORIGINAL CLASSIC GEORGE A. ROMERO'S VERISON HIS MOVIE NOT JOHN A. RUSSO NO MORE NEW SCENES PLEASE IF YOU HAVE THAT MOVIE BURN IT NOW NOW FINALLY NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD THE ORIGINAL VERSION IS ON DVD IN THX 5.1 SOUND WITH A REAL COMMENTARY BY THE MASTER OF HORROR GEORGE A. ROMERO AND THE ENTIRE CAST WITH A FINAL INTERVIEW BY THE STAR DUANE JONES AND A VIDEO INTERVIEW JUDY RIDLEY THIS IS ONE OF THE BEST VERSIONS OF NIGHT OF THE LIVING THAT I HAVE EVER SEEN THIS MILLENNIUM EDITION RULES

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Horror as horror is meant to be
Review: An absolte must to own if you are a fan of horror. An absolte must to have at Halloween(invite the friends over for a viewing)

As old as this film is, it still entertain, and to think most horror flicks just wouldn't be the same without this "first on the block" film.

Rating: 2 stars
Summary: This refers to the 30th anniversary edition.
Review: What I don't get is the new footage. They didn't fit the movie and all they did was destroy it. The new music ruined it also. I hated the new ending. I mean come on! 1 year later all the zombies were destroyed? NOTHING in the new footage had anything to do with Night of the Living Dead or the rest of the series. Just buy the Millenium edition.

Rating: 2 stars
Summary: Mutilation
Review: This 30th Anniversary Edition takes the original Night of the Living Dead movie and throws in a new soundtrack and new scenes. As far as I was concerned, the original movie was perfect as is and this was unnecessary, however I decided to be openminded and give this edition a chance considering that the new material was written by John Russo (who co-wrote the original movie), and has photography (and acting) by Hinzman (who also helped create the original). I was completely let down.

The new scenes include a new introduction, miscellaneous scenes of zombies marching and getting killed by rednecks, and a new epilogue. The miscellaneous scenes sometimes interfere with the flow of the movie, the makeup is less effective, and some of the new extras are terrible. They do a half decent job of editing in the new scenes, but they are still noticeable (for example, the fashions are not quite right). The new introduction and epilogue are ridiculous.

The intro merely establishes that the lead zombie (played by Hinzman) was a criminal when alive. This takes away from one of the films most effective elements: that the zombies could be your next door neighbour or a close friend or relative, but they will still mindlessly try to kill you. Hinzman is obviously older in the frontal shots (the profiles are okay). When he starts attacking two gravediggers, one of the "actors" begins running away then realizes Hinzman was supposed to grab him first, so he actually goes back to the coffin and leans down so Hinzman can grab him!!! The fact they didn't do a second take shows a lack of care.

The epilogue is a "one year later" interview with an insane hellfire and brimstone preacher who survived the carnage. It is stuck in the middle (spoiler warning) of the scene of Duane Jones being killed and the ending credits showing the rednecks disposing of his body!! Talk about interfering with a very effective ending!

You do have the option to watch the original cut (on an excellent print), but you can only watch it with the new soundtrack! The old soundtrack was made up of library music, but it worked excellently. At best, the new soundtrack is mediocre. Sometimes it doesn't even fit the mood of the scene, for example being frantic when the action is more sedate and depressive.

The booklet contains interviews mostly consisting of the actors talking about how "flawlessy" the new scenes were added and how old fans will love the new version (wrong). There is a fun commentary track, but you get the same people (plus others, including Romero) giving the same info on the commentary tracks in the far superior Elite Millennium Edition.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Confusing Reviews
Review: Many of the negative review below are for the Anchor Bay 30th Anniversary Limited Edition which has a new (mediocre) soundtrack and new footage, and have nothing to do with the dvd listed here, so don't get confused by all the negative reviews. This Elite edition is the definitive Night of the Living Dead dvd, approved by George Romero and stacked with extras. I doubt I need to go into what an excellent and important film this is or try to talk you into getting at least one version, so if you are just unsure of which edition to get, this is the one!

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Whew, Amazon Really Has Made A Mess of This!
Review: Why would Amazon lump all the reviews of the many editions of this movie together? Holy cow, what a mess! Who the hell knows what you're gonna wind up with, right?

This review is for the "Special Collector's Edition" DVD. The sound and picture quality are excellent, you get some nice extras and there are not one, but two, audio commentaries available for your delight!! Now you can pick up little bits of wisdom that were previously unavailable. Yeah, the movie gets the royal treatment that it deserves. A winner in every sense.

Rating: 1 stars
Summary: A great film butchered.
Review: This review pertains only to the "30th Anniversary Edition".

I had been collecting George A. Romero's "Living Dead" trilogy on DVD and had purchased this without paying enough attention. Big mistake.

Night of the Living Dead has had some colossally confusing release patterns thanks to a copyright gaffe which had enabled every company under the sun to release the film and profit from it. But of the 'rogue editions' I've seen, nothing is worse than this one.

Notice the list of personnel involved in this project: John Russo, Russ Streiner, Bill Hinzman...anybody missing? That's right: George A. Romero himself. This "30th Anniversary" edition is a collaborated effort by Romero's former colleagues in the Night of the Living Dead crew to rip off Romero's work and make a profit from it.

The result is disastrous indeed. The new footage written and directed by John Russo serve to butcher the original film. Not only do the new scenes not contribute to the story, they look amateurish, mostly due to horrible writing. Russo had always wanted to claim more credit for the success of Night of the Living Dead than was due him; this attempt at appropriating credit for the original film only shows that Romero is the only one who understands the concept of the Living Dead films. Russo's heinous, childish writing and direction -- which are no better than that of the tongue-in-cheek soft-core videographers of, say, Seduction Cinema -- barely rise above the level of beginner film students. And his claim that the new footage matches the old is just ludicrous. Basically Streiner, Russo, Hinzman et al. have raped Romero's film, trying to use their involvement in the original to steal credit from Romero's work, desperately trying to put as much of their handprint onto the original as possible with this 'new footage'. Well, one minute watching Dawn of the Dead will show you that Romero was the filmmaker, and the others were the hacks.

Yet another guilty party in this whole enterprise is Scott Vladimir Licina, who had composed a new score for the film and plays a priest in the new scenes. The new score jars terribly with the old footage, and Licina's acting is atrocious -- reflective of the all-around low quality of the Russo footage.

Skip this one, crucify it, and leave it out for the zombies to chew on. This edition is a disgrace to Romero's legacy. Night of the Living Dead is one of the greatest horror films ever made; don't allow this sacrilegious edition to mislead your perception on the original film.

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: An excellent movie for the horror genre!
Review: George A. Romero's (1968) original theatrical release of Night Of The Living Dead...is an excellent example of what a zombie horror movie should be like!...

The Elite Entertainment THX certified mono audio soundtrack and transfer are by far the best I've seen for Night Of The Living Dead...

The Elite Entertainment...Millenium Edition Night Of The Living Dead...Adds an excellent 5.1 Surround Dolby Soundtrack...making this the version of choice!...

Don't be fooled however...If you're looking for an affordable THX certified horror movie that holds up by today's standard of horror movies...Then Night Of The Living Dead should be a serious consideration for your DVD collection...

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: NOTLD: A Thin Wall Between Order and Chaos
Review: Those who have seen NOTLD usually claim that it is one of the scariest if not the scariest horror film of all time. The reasons most often mentioned include the grainy black and white pseudo-documentary filming, the heretofore unbroken taboo of onscreen cannabalism, the bold decision to use a black man as the protagonist, and the dreary ordinariness of the zombies. Certainly, the sum of these factors makes it easy to tag this film as something special in the horror genre. Yet for NOTLD, the whole is somehow more than the sum of its parts. There are other films in other genres that had talented directors consciously try tactics that would appeal to the immediate senses of the viewer. What separates the merely effective film from the truly memorable one is what the director presents as lurking beneath the surface. In the horror genre, Alfred Hitchcock is the acknowledged master of the subconscious demon that lurks in us all. George Romero, the director of NOTLD, surely runs a close second. What Romero manages to do in NOTLD is similar to what Ridley Scott managed a decade later in ALIEN. Romero knew that walls and claustrophobia often interact on the screen to produce a creepy feeling in the audience. In fact, walls and wall-breaking become the central metaphor of this film. As the movie opens, a zombie attacks a woman who seeks safety in her car. The zombie tries to break in by smashing the car's window. The woman seeks safety in a house, and with the aid of other normal humans, seeks to buttress the structural integrity of the house by using nails and boards. Soon enough a horde of slow-moving corpses tries to smash into the house. Eventually they succeed. The grotestque climax occurs when the recently murdered brother of the woman reaches through a smashed door and drags his poor screaming sister out into the night to be devoured. The cumulative impact of this scene scares the viewer on more than one level. The horror of seeing a sister ripped apart by her ghoul brother is surely nasty enough, but Romero amplifies this grotesqueness by suggesting that the malevolent events of this movie are nothing more than an exaggeration of a fundamental principle of life--that the order and stability of this universe has only the thinnest of gossamer protection against the terror and chaos that exists just inches from that wall. It is almost as if Romero is suggesting that the nightmares which afflict us all are only glimpses into that anarchic nada which preceeded the origins of our universe. If a nightmare glimpse scares the ordinary individual, then, he shows on the screen what the grim reality of a wall collapse must be like. This other nightmare universe sucks us into its foul regions where the dead are not dead at all. By the end of the film, the audience is forced to see that the dramatic focus of the title is not on the living at all, but on the dead. And it is this soul-shaking divination that causes a new generation of audiences to continually reappraise the sometimes elusive distinction between that which is dead and that which is not.


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