Night of the Living Dead review

 Number 327 on the top 1000 films of all time is George Romero's 1968 zombie-horror film 'Night of the Living Dead.'

Barbra (Judith O'Dea) and her brother are laying flowers on her father's grave when her brother is attacked by a zombie. Barbra runs in terror to a nearby house where she meets Ben (Duane Jones) and a group of other survivors. Together, they need to figure out how to survive the coming zombie hordes.

I am conflicted about this film. I am well-aware of its reputation. In many ways, it pioneered the zombie-horror genre popularising many of the tropes we now see in the likes of the Walking Dead Franchise or Z Nation. However, at its heart, 'Night of the Living Dead' is a siege film.

A group of characters are boarded up in a location and are besieged by an enemy force. Romero's unrelated sequel Dawn of the Dead follows a similar plot line. But I often find siege films lacking in tension and forward momentum. The characters are stuck in one place not going anywhere neither physically or emotionally. In many ways, Night of the Living Dead also fell into this trap until the characters decide to escape for a safer location.

That is until they start making stupid decisions which screws everything up. Stupid characters making stupid decisions for no other reason than to forward the plot is an annoying and tiresome cliche. Unfortunately it has become a mainstay of horror films. Is Night of the Living Dead to blame for this? I'm not sure.

What I am sure about is how I did not like how they reduced Barbra to little more than a damsel-in-distress. After she is rescued by Ben, she very much becomes an empty shell lacking in agency. While this would be a realistic reaction, it is difficult to believe that a character like that could survive in a world like this. Originally, Barbra was written with more grit, but upon casting Judith O'Dea, Romero rewrote her character.

But one thing Romero did right was the casting of Duane Jones as Ben. He very much carried the film on his back, as Ben was the leader of the survivors. Plus, it was a rare occurrence to have a black man star in a 1960's film. Originally, Ben was supposed to be a crude, un-educated truck  driver, but at the intellectual Jones' insistence, he was changed into a more well-rounded leader.

One cliche I was glad not to see was the one black character dying first in the horror film.

*spoilers*

In fact, Ben was the last one to die. And I did not like how he died. It wasn't in a glorious last stand with the zombies, but by a posse of white men who mistake him for one of the undead and promptly shoot him. But was it a mistake? There are some who have read into the racial undertones of a white man shooting a black man in the backdrop of the Civil Rights Movement.

Either way, I found it to be an anti-climatic death unworthy of a good character. Reportedly, Jones wanted it this way saying it would be too Hollywood for him to be the last-man standing. That, notwithstanding, I would have preferred if he had been killed by a paranoid or scared man panicking over whether Ben was a zombie or not. Then his death might have had more meaning.

Nonetheless, I did enjoy Night of the Living Dead. It wasn't without its flaws, but it was still entertaining.