Marathon of Shops: Dawn of the Dead (2004)

There’s almost nothing as fun as rewatching a movie and rediscovering what you loved about it.  For a person who watches a lot of movies, this is a wonderful delight.  Memories flood back and new elements of a familiar tale are found.  It becomes more about the journey than the destination.   The Zack Snyder remake of Dawn of the Dead is one such movie.

Dawn of the Dead is a 1978 classic, but this is not about that one.  Dawn of the Dead was remade in 2004 by writer James Gunn and director Zack Snyder.  It was an update on a well known George Romero flick that brought the action to a more modern time, and sped up the action while also having the Snyder slow motion effects.  Sarah Polley, Ving Rhames, and Ty Burrell starred among many other people whose faces pop up in movies every once in a while.

Why is the kid from Air Bud looking at his feet?

The most notable thing about the movie was how Zack Snyder handled the material.  Many of the trademarks of Snyder’s future films showed up throughout the roughly hour and forty-five minute runtime.  There were slow motion shots interspersed with normal speed interspersed with scenes that felt faster than normal.  It was not quite to the level that he would use this technique in films such as 300 or Watchmen, but this element was present in the movie.  The soundtrack was also there.  Aside from 300, every Snyder movie that I have seen has featured a great collection of music that was not the score.  Dawn of the Dead features Johnny Cash, Richard Cheese covering Disturbed, and Disturbed performing the song that Richard Cheese covered, among the music.  Each song was placed well within the movie to help give power to the moments.  These trademarks were not as used as in other Snyder efforts but were still present within his debut feature film.

Also of note is the caliber of acting in Dawn of the Dead.  The average zombie movie is not known for the acting skills of the actors involved.  In the case of this movie, the acting was solid, if not great.  I want to single out Ty Burrell.  Going into this movie, I had forgotten how good he actually is.  Burrell gave a performance that showed the possibility of acting performances in his future.  The way he plays the non-redemptive asshole character makes you completely hate him, without the need to have the character kill children or animals.  The distaste for the character came from the mannerisms and the way he delivered his dialogue much more than the actions the character took.  Burrell performed it astonishingly well and it is no wonder that he has won an Emmy since then.  He is a great performer.

Gimme a kiss.

People are too quick to argue that remakes of movies are always bad.  They tend to forget that a remake such as Dawn of the Dead can come around and change things up to make another solid movie.  The whole mentality of bad remakes causes many good ones to go unnoticed because people will dismiss them on that basis.  Dawn of the Dead is a good remake that deserves to be watched.  Not because it has gone unnoticed.  This is a fairly well known remake.  It deserves to be watched because it is a good, fun horror flick about people trapped in a mall and surrounded by zombies.  If you have any interest in it, watch it.  You will not be sorry.

The next movie up in the Marathon of Shops is obviously going to be the original Dawn of the Dead.  1978, people!  George Romero, people in a mall, directly caused the awesome remake to happen.  This is one that can’t be missed.  And that’s all I have to say about that.