When one wants to compile a list of zombie films and really break them down the argument over which is THE best could go on forever with no clear winner. Simply put, there’s no real way to tell which is truly the best. While I myself am and always will be a big fan of The Return of the Living Dead (to spite running zombies), when you want a film that is legit creepy in the zombie sub-genre of horror I feel it comes down to two films…
Dawn of the Dead (also known as Zombi internationally) and Zombi 2 (also known as Zombie, Island of the Living Dead, Zombie Island, Zombie Flesh Eaters and Woodoo).
Dawn of the Dead was the classic made by the legendary, George A. Romero, as the follow up zombie film to the classic Night of the Living Dead. And while “Night” will always be a classic, it’s my opinion that Dawn of the Dead tops it in every way. Dawn of the Dead, is also one of the few films I’ve rated with a fill 10 out of 10 on this site. In the film the world has gone to hell, the dead have taken over more or less, and we follow a few survivors trying to stay alive inside a mall. The film had many creepy things about it, including the theme to it, and it didn’t hurt at all that the film also featured effects from another legend, Tom Savini.
Zombie (probably better known as Zombi 2), was from the twisted mind of another legend, Lucio Fulci. Internationally released as the actual sequel to “Dawn”, Zombie 2 dropped the connection and was released in the states as a stand alone film in July of 1980. While just as bloody as Dawn of the Dead, having just as cool of a theme, and also featuring the “Romero-like” slow zombies, Zombie featured not one but two scenes that are now considered classic by the masses. One scene consisting of a zombie underwater fighting a shark and another having a eye slowly being impaled by wood from a busted door. While I never gave it a fill 10 when I reviewed it, I still consider it almost as legendary as Romero’s classic.
But which one is better?
Giving one film a 10 and the other film a 7, I can’t logically now try to say Zombie was better. While both films start off with action before slowing down to build to more action, I do think if there’s one thing Zombie did better than Dawn of the Dead it was the fact that the zombies look more realistic. Where with Dawn of the Dead you get a lot of cool looking zombies but you also get a lot of people with just green-ish faces, Zombie looks more legit in my opinion when it comes to the dead and their returning appearances. But while it’s hard to really top a battle between a zombie and a shark, Romero (still in classic form) did the hard task of just making Dawn of the Dead feel important and epic. Also, underneath it all Dawn of the Dead did have a very strong social commentary that at the time wasn’t played out. I may be wrong, but did Fulci really have any hidden agenda in the making of Zombie? I do however think Fulci did violence and creepy better than Romero ever did, he just lacks a real meaning in his work and again, lacks the overall “epic” feel Romero at least brought to Dawn of the Dead.
So while the debate goes on, and will probably go on long after we are all gone, I have to give the edge to Dawn of the Dead to spite loving Zombie 2 as well. But there are many more out there who like one over the other for far better reasons than I. So if you’d like to pick your own winner here and give some reasons I’d love to hear them.
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