Setting the Stage for Night of the Living Dead
The year is 1968. America finds herself in a destressing but now-familiar peril: the nation is split harshly over the rising demand for racial equality and a war in which the necessity of American involvement is unclear. Martin Luther King Jr. delivers speeches inspiring millions of Black Americans to demand the rights they are entitled to by virtue of their humanity. Even still, issues of social integration and equality face feral opposition from much of the voting populous. Overseas, a vicious war has bloomed; dinner tables on the homefront sit in tense silence when someone raises the issue of the Tet Offensive—of Vietnam. University students protest for peace, to much hand-wringing on the limits of freedom of speech.
The Beatles sing hello to Jude for the first time. Mister Rogers warmly calls you “neighbor”.
Americans face a harsh reality, placid and dusted with Avon powder: many wonder who their neighbors really are. Could I trust these people in a crisis? Could we coexist in nuclear winter? Do they understand justice in the same way that I do?
The Film’s Legacy and Production
In Pittsburgh, one year prior, 27-year-old George Romero films his first feature film on a shoestring budget of $114,000. Having read Richard Matheson’s I Am Legend, equally coy about naming the monster driving it’s horror, Romero set out to instill a new kind of terror deeper than the giants and monsters familiar to film audiences of the era. Night of the Living Dead, despite never once using the word “zombie”, laid the foundation for an entire subgenre of horror—and contingency plans among friend groups for generations.
The original black-and-white flick features an ensemble cast with, crucially, Duane Jones and Judith O’ Dea at the forefront, marking the first time that a Black actor would star in a horror film. Pat Saperstein would later claim Night of the Living Dead “was said to be a critique of capitalism during the counter-culture era.” The film even inspired an anti-capitalist goth rock song “The Undead” by Voodoo Church with samples from the film and a nonfiction book by Daniel Kraus.
Between the, for the time, diverse cast and potentially anti-capitalist sentiments during the outbreak of national tensions surrounding racial equality and global terror of communism, Romero’s Night of the Living Dead proved to not only be an excellent film, but a championing voice of the countercultural movement. Romero later said, “I wanted that stuff to look like newsreels, everything from the race riots in the south to police coming out with dogs.”
The intent certainly comes through. The level of detail of the makeup and unglamorous setting lend the film a haunting relatability that holds up today. The film even used real news broadcasters local to Pennsylvania to announce updates and instructions to the characters. Romero’s choice to use 35mm film reels adds a sense of grittiness and texture, as though the reel had been found in an attic.
Romero and ten collaborators initially contributed $600 (the equivalent of just over $6,000 today) to create a film production studio of their own called Image Ten. Beyond each member’s individual contribution, Romero and company pitched the idea to dozens of investors to scrape together their initial budget. Over the course of filming, their modest and practical set was doused in Bosco’s chocolate syrup, roasted ham, and animal organs donated by a local butcher to create its characteristic gore. In 2018, the Criterion collection released the stunning 4K remaster of Night of the Living Dead, leading to the version accessible today.
The Story
The film opens with a long shot focused on a car descending a bleak and barren Pennsylvania hill. Two siblings, Johnny and Barbara, have set out to deliver flowers to their late father’s grave. Almost immediately, the two notice suited and strange figures wandering aimlessly, looking dazed and sickly. One attacks Barbara. She’s saved by Johnny, who wrestles with the ghoul while Barbara tries catastrophically to escape, crashing their car in the process, and stumbles into a nearby farmhouse shell-shocked and catatonic, kicking off the rest of the film.
For the remaining 90 minutes, the ensemble of seven characters board up windows, light table legs like torches, and bicker about the basement. They find a television and a radio to listen for updates and learn that the phenomenon is most likely caused by a manmade spaceship loaded with radiation that had been destroyed just beyond orbit. Outside, undead creatures descend on and overwhelm the house, desperately trying to murder and devour its occupants. During an attempt to escape the farm house and find safety at a local stronghold with supplies and shelter, much of the group is devoured.
Reception
Arriving just in time for the phasing out of the Hays Code, the film was still popular at the time in spite of backlash surrounding the violence featured in it. The Hays Code’s strict demands of moral purity in the dust, Romero was free to depict voracious cannibalism on screen. Because it contained no nudity as presented in 1968, parents assumed that it was a safe watch for their families and the film found a loyal audience in children and teenagers, who regularly attended matinee screenings.
Roger Ebert loved Night of the Living Dead and watched it twice in theaters, rating it 3.5 stars but, of the discussion surrounding it, he wrote, “Censorship is not the answer. But I would be ashamed to make a civil libertarian argument defending the “right” of those little girls and boys to see a film which left a lot of them stunned with terror.”
Due to a copyright error, Night of the Living Dead landed in the public domain, shortstopping any additional profits Romero may have earned from his work. The film inspired countless movies, including remakes, sequels, and spin-offs, including the Zack Snyder Dawn of the Dead remake and the horror-comedy Shaun of the Dead. George Romero went on to write and direct five more movies in the franchise, canonizing himself as the king of zombies forever.