Land of the Dead

Posted in Mike Wood's blog on ,

Land of the Dead is the fourth zombie film from George Romero, who pretty much started the genre with Night of the Living Dead in the late 1960s. Romero uses the backdrop of a zombie plague to look at the way people interact, their motivations and their flaws. Land of the Dead is considerably more upfront about this than even his earlier, rather bold, films.

The basic premise is that the last survivors of humanities brush with the living dead are holed up in a city called “Fiddler’s Green”. They’ve blocked out the zombies and the rich live pretty much as they did before, whilst the poor are brought off with alcohol, gambling, and the continual threat of zombie invasion. Fiddler’s Green is, in mythology, the sailor’s heaven, and this choice of name for the last outpost of humanity has a certain, none too subtle, irony to it. The heaven of consumerism that capitalism has created is built on some pretty hellish foundations.

The rich pay the poor to raid the zombie infested towns surrounding the city, and then they sell the produce to the other denizens. The poor have to go through this process just to stay alive, all the while continuing to make money for someone else. The zombies, in the mean time, get angry that their towns are being destroyed, and amass to attack Fiddler’s Green and take their revenge. The parallels with the current world situation are obvious, and it comes as no surprise that this script couldn’t get any funding in the aftermath of 9/11.

Romero provides us with three possible ways out of the situation for the exploited workers, in the form of three character’s responses and plans. Firstly, they can try to rise out of their class and become rich. Romero’s conclusion is that this involves screwing over those around you, and is, in the end, unlikely to actually get you anywhere. Secondly they can take power and run society for themselves, and thirdly, they can just try and get out of complicated society altogether. The third conclusion has always been the one Romero has supported in the past, but here the ending is considerably more ambiguous. It is much more favourable towards the second option than his previous work. The hero of the film, Riley, represents the third option, but he is shown to be considerably more naïve than many of those around him about the nature of the society they live in.

Several moments of this film are simply brilliant. The capitalist in charge of Fiddler’s Green, Kaufman, has a lengthy rant at one point on the fact that he has the right to make the decisions as he has taken the responsibility. He took the responsibility to build walls and to employ workers, etc. His sense of entitlement to the fruits of the production process is so strong that when the zombies attack the city his response is to scream “You have no right!” at them repeatedly.

The sense of dread that permeates all of Romero’s zombie work is here too, as strong as ever. Most horror films made at the moment seem to rely on cheap tricks to scare, that basically amount to simply shouting “Boo!” very loudly at the audience occasionally. Land of the Dead is scary in a completely different way. The zombies are slow, shambling, and comical, but also numerous and unrelenting. It’s the very concept of the film that creates the feeling of constant threat.

There are still many flaws to the film though. Several plot lines are left unresolved, and much simply doesn’t make sense. However, the previous Romero zombie films have a tendency to ramble somewhat, and this is certainly the tightest of them so far. My only other real complaint is that what previously distinguished Romero’s work was a certain down to earth grittiness in his approach to an essentially outlandish subject. Here too much of the film is based on computer graphics, and it can occasionally just look rather silly. The sophisticated stuff sometimes looks less realistic than the effects Tom Savini used to do with red paint and plasticine. Romero, previously unable to afford high tech gadgetry, gives the impression of having gone overboard on his first big budget film in a forty year career.

Overall it’s definitely worth a look. It’s one of the most socially conscious films you could ever hope to see, even if it is basically about the dead walking around and trying to eat the living.

Comments

Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Mon, 03/10/2005 - 21:01

I loved the film, but then I'm of the opinion Romero's something of a genius anyway...

I don't know if it was just me but beyond the obvious (and often intentional) parallels with the "War on Terror" there were a number of moments which reminded me of the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. Given that the film was finished (and possibly released in the states) long before the Hurricane hit this couldn't have been intentional, but it does point to the fundamental truth Romero was portraying: the rich don't give a fuck about the poor.

On the issue of social change I'd be interested in your opinions on the portrayal of Mulligan and his ragged bunch of freedom fighters. In my opinion this was probably the most underdeveloped element in the film and raised various interesting questions. (The system they are challenging is, after all, the main thing protecting them from the zombies - at least at the start of the film.)

Dk
http://disillusionedkid.blogspot.com

Submitted by Mike Wood on Wed, 05/10/2005 - 12:39

In reply to by Anonymous (not verified)

It's certainly my favorite of his films, which is saying something. There is a certain no-nonsense approach to the social issues involved this time. Instead of skirting round them and offering the occasional light piece of commentary Romero appears to have come out all guns blazing this time.

It's interesting that you should mention Katrina. The film was indeed released before Katrina came out, and was certainly scripted before then. But in fact it was scripted prior to the "War on Terror" as well, and simply had a hard time getting made for many years because of the obvious resonances in it. The parallel's with the aftermath of 9/11 are unintenional in so far as Romero didn't know about those events when he was writing, as they hadn't happened yet. But as you say, the fundamental truth about it all is what Romero was getting at, and that is not something that's arisen in the War on Terror, but has been there all along. Some lines take on an almost prescient quality in light of this (e.g. Kaufman's "We do not negotiate with terrorists!").

With regards to Mulligan, he is obviously the other option I've mentioned in the review. Cholo represents our ability to rise from the working class, not with it. Riley represents our ability to just get out of society, to just run away from it all. And Mulligan is basically a socialist, or at least a fighter for the victory of the working class. The interesting thing is that previously Romero had always poured scorn on the characters in his films who wanted to sort out all the problems and build a better society. He portrays them as naive, and the problems they fight against are usually shown to be intrinsic to humanity. The preferred option for Romero is Riley's option, or at least always had been. Look at the end of Day of the Dead - it basically just calls for localised politics as opposed to the evils of complicated society. It's all very postmodern.

But throughout Land of the Dead there are, rather interestingly, little jabs at Riley's naivete instead of Mulligan's. And as Riley and friends drive off into the night, fireworks blazing, you can't help but feel Romero is slightly taking the mickey. When Riley displays scepticism about Mulligan's idea of running society for the benefit of the poor, not the rich, he is made to look foolish. Mulligan basically answers his reservations about where it will all end by saying "It's worth a try". That seems to be Romero's new conclusion - he's sceptical about how our attempts to make things better will turn out, but it's probably worth a try.

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