The Weinsteins picked up Romero's Diary of the Dead. Here's the story in the Reporter.
I picked up Land of the Dead from Amoeba the other day for the princely sum of $1.99.
I admit, the price drove the purchase. I thought Land was okay in the theater when I saw it. But, when you're holding a movie up against stuff like the original Dawn of the Dead, or even recent movies like 28 Days Later, it was hard to get excited.
But only spending two bucks and watching it at home with a beer in hand... I loved it. This is a super-tight story on fuckin' rails, man. It's the anti-Day, where everyone sits around and nothing much happens until a massive set piece at the end. I've come to love Day, but it took a while to find the particular charms to that movie. And I don't know anybody who names Day as their favorite of the original Dead trilogy.
Land isn't perfect. Some of the dialogue is painfully on-the-nose. Romero's smart enough to give the really "duh" lines to the stupid guy Simon Baker hangs out with. But I still thought... do we need an explanation of what "flowers in the graveyard" means when they shoot fireworks to distract the zombies? C'mon...
I also winced when Baker gets his SWAT team of obvious zombie-munch fodder. Each member comes into the room and makes this clunky little character introduction. It seemed really comic book.
"I'm the Matador, and you can tell because I wear this matador thing on my shoulder to help you remember. Otherwise, I'm completely indistinguishable!"
"I'm the mean bitch who swears a lot, so fuck you fucking fuckers!"
"I'm the really big guy who eats a lot, when do we eat?"
I'm paraphrasing, of course. But that's the impression I got. This kinda thing also ruined Blade II for me.
Weirdly enough, I totally forgot Asia Argento's in this movie. We're going after her to play Mina Harker in The Un-Dead. After watching Land, I really really really hoped we get her.
John Leguizamo's awesome in Land. Simon Baker's fine, but his character (whose name I can't even remember) is such a goodie two-shoes that Leguizamo's Cholo just steals every scene. He's kind of a dick, but it's just because he's a driven alpha male. He's not a guy you fuck with. And I really dug his friendship with Foxy; it felt real.
There's also a cool Latin flavor to this movie: lots of Latino actors, a Spanish-club soundtrack in the seedy bar where Asia almost gets killed, etc. It felt like a fresh aspect to the zombie genre. Having played way too much Resident Evil IV, zombies and the Spanish language seemed to go hand-in-hand. Let's see more. I'd love something like El Mariachi vs. zombies.
I'm really glad I dropped the two bucks.
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2 comments:
i am a huge fan of day. each one of romeros films are diffrent from each other. night was more survival of everyday people against mindless zombies.
dawn was a pure action movie..lots of gore and action. new twist on the zombies remembering what they used to do.
day was what happens to people who are basiclay the last people on earth and trying to find a way to fix the problem and zombies get smarter. the origional screenplay was fucking awesome i would hightly suggest ya read it.. its on the day of the dead special edition dvd. zombie armies the whole works. actuly it was more like land of the dead.
Now in land of the dead the zombies are smarter and decide to really fight back. really liked land in its own way. its diffrent from the others as it was ment to.
diery of the dead is going to be fucking awesome. its about a group of kids who basialy want to go home from what i read on aicn. i cant fucking wait for this. from what i read not alot of gore. im ok with that. some of the best movies dont have hardly any gore such as carpenters halloween or even the exorcist.
Yeah, I'd say most of the classics are surprisingly gore-free... Texas Chain Saw comes to mind.
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