A helicopter traffic reporter, his news executive girlfriend and two SWAT team members lock themselves inside a local mall to keep shelter from the zombie hoards outside.
Steven (David Emge) and girlfriend Francine (Gaylen Ross) are inside the television station when it is under attack by a zombie hoard. Along with SWAT members Peter (Ken Foree) and Roger (Scott H. Reiniger), they take the station’s helicopter and make their escape to find a safe haven.
They come upon a mall that doesn’t seem to have been taken over by the zombies outside. After killing all of the undead inside, they have a decent place to live with food, clothes and everything else they might need to survive. Soon they are attacked by a biker gang who wants what they have and they are forced to fight them off as well as the plague of zombies that have now entered the mall.
Dawn of the Dead is the second in the Romero zombie series, falling behind Night of the Living Dead. In terms of quality, Dawn of the Dead is easily the best in the series. Thanks to the special effects work of Tom Savini, who is also a character in the film, Dawn provides us with copious amounts of blood and gore to accompany the decayed melting pot of zombies the team faces.
The story line is brilliant. If you had to think of one place that supplied everything one might need in the event of a zombie apocalypse, what better place than a mall? There are shops with food, clothes, sports equipment, shoes and beds. You wouldn’t need for anything because everything is there. You would just have to barricade the entrances and keep an eye out for the possibility of threats.
In the beginning, the group sleeps on the floor in a small room and barely ventures out, but as they eliminate the threat inside, they eat in the restaurants, go shopping for clothes and play video games in the arcade. It is as if life inside the mall is exactly as it was before the apocalypse happened. They don’t go overboard with things though. They are fully aware that everything is there when they need it, so they only take what they need, when they need it. Unfortunately, not everyone thinks like them.
A group of bikers breaks in carelessly and busts the mall apart, looting for whatever they could find of value. Along with them comes a hoard of zombies, ruining the home our group has created.
Romero shows how the human race deteriorates in the event of an emergency of such a caliber. In this apocalypse, the zombies are less of a threat than the humans are. The zombies are acting out of straight instinct while this biker group has a choice in everything they do. They have chosen to put the group’s life in danger for a few valuable items they don’t even realize aren’t valuable anymore.
Dawn of the Dead is one of the best horror films out there. The zombies are amazing, the story is creative and Romero’s insight on the human race is enlightening. If you don’t watch any other zombie film, this is the one to see.
===========================================================================================================================================
Ann Hale is the horror editor for Pop-Break.com and a senior contributing writer, reviewing horror movies and television shows. She is also the American Correspondent for Lovehorror.co.uk. Ann attended East Carolina University, majoring in English Literature. She is a collector of Halloween (the film) memorabilia and is a self-admitted opinionated horror nerd. You can follow her, her collection and her cat, Edward Kittyhands on Twitter and Instagram @Scarletjupiter
===========================================================================================================================================
