Night of the Living Dead

UPC: 796019811743

Studio: Weinstein Company

MPAA Rating: NR   Contains:[Not For Children, Profanity, Gore]

Summary: When unexpected radiation raises the dead, a microcosm of Average America has to battle flesh-eating zombies in George A. Romero's landmark cheapie horror film. Siblings Johnny (Russ Streiner) and Barbara (Judith O'Dea) whine and pout their way through a graveside visit in a small Pennsylvania town, but it all takes a turn for the worse when a zombie kills Johnny. Barbara flees to an isolated farmhouse where a group of people are already holed up. Bickering and panic ensue as the group tries to figure out how best to escape, while hoards of undead converge on the house; news reports reveal that fire wards them off, while a local sheriff-led posse discovers that if you "kill the brain, you kill the ghoul." After a night of immolation and parricide, one survivor is left in the house.... Romero's grainy black-and-white cinematography and casting of locals emphasize the terror lurking in ordinary life; as in Alfred Hitchcock's The Birds (1963), Romero's victims are not attacked because they did anything wrong, and the randomness makes the attacks all the more horrifying. Nothing holds the key to salvation, either, whether it's family, love, or law. Topping off the existential dread is Romero's then-extreme use of gore, as zombies nibble on limbs and viscera. Initially distributed by a Manhattan theater chain owner, Night, made for about 100,000 dollars, was dismissed as exploitation, but after a 1969 re-release, it began to attract favorable attention for scarily tapping into Vietnam-era uncertainty and nihilistic anxiety. By 1979, it had grossed over 12 million, inspired a cycle of apocalyptic splatter films like The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (1974), and set the standard for finding horror in the mundane. However cheesy the film may look, few horror movies reach a conclusion as desolately unsettling. ~ Lucia Bozzola, Rovi

Category: Horror

Awards: U.S. National Film Registry – Library of Congress

Features: 2 Feature audio-commentaries: Featuring George A. Romero and Members of the cast & crew
One For The Fire: A New, feature-length documentary
Speak to the Dead: A Q&A; with Co-Writer/Director George A. Romero
Ben Speaks: The last interview with actor Duane Jones
Theatrical trailer
Still gallery
Original script (DVD-ROM)

Night of the Living Dead

Format: DVD

Release Date: 05/20/2008

Aspect Ratio: 1.33:1 Pre-1954 Standard

Audio: DD2 Dolby Digital Stereo, DD5.1 Dolby Digital 5.1

Runtime: 96 Minutes

Sides: 1

Number of Discs: 1

Language(s) English

Subtitles: Spanish,English

Region: USA & territories, Canada

Chapters: Disc #1 -- Night of the Living Dead
1. Main Titles [:19]
2. "They're Coming To Get You, Barbra!" [:20]
3. Sanctuary [4:30]
4. Ben Arrives [5:18]
5. The First Kills [3:13]
6. Boarding Up [2:39]
7. Tales of Terror [3:54]
8. News Reports [4:26]
9. Taking Stock [7:19]
10. Up from the Cellar [3:50]
11. The Dead Advance [4:45]
12. In the Basement [4:20]
13. Emergency Broadcast [4:15]
14. Planning an Escape [3:55]
15. Making a Break [9:40]
16. All Messed Up [4:41]
17. Karen Revives [8:01]
18. The Last Refuge [5:16]
19. Dawn of the Dead [5:58]
20. End Credits [2:40]

Mark Deming

When George A. Romero, a Pittsburgh-based director of TV commercials and industrial films, persuaded a few buddies to pitch in some money for a case of film stock so that he could shoot a zombie movie on the weekends, he had no idea that he would forever change the American horror movie. With his first effort, Romero shattered the rules of the horror genre; Night of the Living Dead retained many of the iconic elements of the traditional horror movie, but without the emotional buffering of most films that preceded it. In this film, the good guys didn't win, the monsters became only more powerful, the authority figures protecting us were both dangerous and inept, the source of the contagion was both unexplained and unstoppable, and, as friends and families were pitted against each other, no one got away unscathed. The early films of Herschell Gordon Lewis predated it in putting graphic gore on screen, but while Blood Feast and Two Thousand Maniacs seemed almost comical in their candy-colored carnage, Night's stark black-and-white images of zombies feeding on their human victims possessed a blunt and troubling realism that broke new, stomach-churning ground. And while Night's political allegories are more subtle than those of such later Romero films as The Crazies and Dawn of the Dead, its open distrust of authority and depiction of society on the verge of collapse certainly mark it as a film of the Vietnam era; the grim fate of Duane Jones, the film's sole heroic figure and only African-American, had added resonance with the assassinations of Martin Luther King and Malcolm X fresh in the minds of most Americans. At a time when most horror movies took the tack that fear could be fun, Night of the Living Dead offered terror without a spoonful of sugar, and the genre would never be the same again. ~ Mark Deming, Rovi

Cast and Crew: Karl Hardman  Producer 
George A. Romero  Director 
George A. Romero  Screenwriter 
John A. Russo  Screenwriter 
Russ Streiner  Producer 
Judith O'Dea  Actor 
Russ Streiner  Actor 
Duane Jones  Actor 
Karl Hardman  Actor 
Keith Wayne  Actor 
Judith Ridley  Actor 
Marilyn Eastman  Actor 
Kyra Schon  Actor 
Charles Craig  Actor 
Bill Hinzman  Actor 
John Simpson  Actor 
Rossie Harris  Actor 
George A. Romero  Actor 
John A. Russo  Actor 
John A. Russo  Actor 

Country: USA