PopMatters. Night of the Living Dead @ 40.

"Recognizing the everlasting importance of Night of the Living Dead to popular culture, PopMatters is proud to celebrate the 40th Anniversary of [George] Romero's landmark film with this very special, and very frightful, special feature."

There are to be 30 articles in all from "some of the most eminent and distinguished horror film scholars" and the series launches today with a brief (and humble) introduction by Romero himself and another by series editor Marco Lanzagorta: "Romero's film revolutionized the horror genre with its depiction of gruesome violence combined with incisive social commentary that reflected the turbulent cultural and political climate of America during the late 1960s."

Updated through 10/31.

"Like the reputations of many horror films before and since, Night of the Living Dead became a celebrated object on the basis of the controversy that surrounded its release," argues Mark Jancovich.

"Every film in the horror genre leading up to Night of the Living Dead offers some kind of release, a resolution to the terror, and this catharsis is what adds the element of delight to our experience of them," writes Kelly Roberts. "Romero had his influences, like every artist, but his great innovation was to rip away this delight, this false hope, and replace it with an even deeper terror. The radical politics that he says 'crept in through the back door' of his debut heightens the discomfort and the realism, but for me what makes it so scary is fundamentally personal: It's that the people you know, the people you love the most, might turn against you in the most inhuman manner imaginable—by becoming inhuman; and that you might suffer the same fate; and that, even if you somehow escape this living death, you might become a beast through fear of becoming a beast."

"Romero's interpretation of the zombie myth created an archetype perfectly modeled for the modern world," argues Tim Mitchell: "a threat to both individuals and society that grows out of an inexorable need to consume. While Romero's second zombie film, Dawn of the Dead (1978), is most often thought of as his commentary on consumerism, the narrative logic of his zombies that began in Night of the Living Dead make it the first horror film to portray mass consumption as an unstoppable plague."

"More than just a cult favorite, George A Romero's debut, Night of the Living Dead, dovetails right with American film history," writes Matthew Sorrento. "The film showed up just after the benchmark year, 1967, when the mainstream success of Arthur Penn's Bonnie and Clyde and The Graduate urged Hollywood to revolt against its own established myths."

"Even without zombies, the farmhouse's vast, lonely exterior connotes dread, so the inside should suggest the opposite, amplifying the importance of the interior's potential as a safe haven." Chris Justice: "When the inside only compounds the horror, Romero's farmhouse shatters the illusion of our most trusted institution: the American home is as dangerous as the evil outside its walls."

While it's not part of the series, PopMatters is also running George Reisch's piece from The Undead and Philosophy: Chicken Soup for the Soulless: "Romero's zombies have fortified the shopping mall they took over in 1978's Dawn of the Dead and are making quick inroads to politics and global economics."

Update: Robert Horton (no relation to PopMatters, as far as I know) presents a "on the least appreciated Romero zombie picture," Day of the Dead.

Updates, 10/28: "On our second day celebrating the 40th Anniversary of Night of the Living Dead, PopMatters offers six articles that explore some of these theoretical frameworks," writes Marco Lanzagorta. "These essays attempt to give a rationale as to why, after so long, Night of the Living Dead continues to provide a frightful and nightmarish viewing experience."

Online viewing tip. The New York Times' AO Scott revisits the film, too, finding it's got "one of the great opening sequences of all time."

Updates, 10/29: Marco Lanzagorta introduces today's batch of "six articles that discuss issues related to race conflict and phallic control."

"The genius of Night of the Living Dead is that it doesn't stop at merely making you fearful of dead people who want to eat you... it wants you to doubt eveything." Richard Harland Smith at Movie Morlocks: "It makes you cynical, but rather than hardening you into slate it reduces you to jelly, makes you useless like the character Barbra (played by Judith O'Dea), who sinks into a kind of catatonia by the half-hour mark. Like Barbra, we can do nothing but look on as 'this incredible story becomes more ghastly with each report' and the world falls apart around us."

Updates, 10/30: Day 4: "In 'Victim or Vigilante, the Case of the Two Barbras,' Prof Cynthia Freeland discusses Night of the Living Dead in relation to its 1990 remake.... Prof Linnie Blake compares Night of the Living Dead to its latest official sequel, Diary of the Dead.... In 'We're coming to get you, Barbra,' Ian Chant argues that the real villains in Night of the Living Dead are not the zombies, but the selfish people trapped by a situation they cannot comprehend.... In 'Decade of the Dead,' Michael Curtis Nelson provides a detailed analysis of the zombie nightmares created in the new millennium.... On the same pessimist note, in '1968 is Undead' Timothy Gabriele carefully explores the juxtaposition of 1968 vs 2008 through Night of the Living Dead.... Finally, in 'I See Dead People' Marco Lanzagorta argues that the influence of Night of the Living Dead goes far beyond the horror genre."

"Is there really a connection between zombie movies and social unrest?" asks Annalee Newitz at io9. "We decided to do some research and find out. The result? We've got a line graph showing the number of zombie movies coming out in the West each year since 1910 - and there are definite spikes during certain years, which always seem to happen eerily close to historical events involving war or social upheaval." Via Movie City News.

Update, 10/31: Marco Lanzagorta introduces the final round: "In strong contrast to the previous installments of this collection, these articles offer a more personal perspective of the everlasting influence of Night of the Living Dead."

Posted by dwhudson at October 27, 2008 5:39 AM