[BLU-RAY Review] DIARY OF THE DEAD
Anyone who has been reading my writings on the net for a while probably know full well that I love horror movies, especially zombie horror movies. When I was still writing for Filmrot I wrote a review for George A Romero’s Land Of The Dead, which I really enjoyed even if it wasn’t as good as the previous Dead movies. So when news came out that Romero was returning once again to the zombie universe, but this time from a “ground zero” Blair Witch Project style my interest was piqued.
The movie starts out with a voice over from one of the characters, Debra (played by Michelle Morgan), explaining that everything you are watching was filmed by Jason Creed, a film student who had been filming a mummy movie with some friends, when reports started appearing of the dead coming back to life and attacking the living. Fearing for their own safety, as well as their families the group set off for home, with Jason filming everything that happens to them in an attempt to document and help anyone else who might be able to watch it when they can get it out to the masses, as the news reports of events seem to be being doctored to try and cover up the fact that zombies are appearing.
What we are then given is a zombie movie with the camera quite literally thrust into the action as if it were a character in the movie, which, I suppose, as it is being handled by Jason and various other people throughout the movie, it is.
But this works very well. I still haven’t seen Cloverfield (yeah, I know – so sue me! I’m waiting for the Blu-Ray release as I didn’t catch it in the cinema when it was on), or Redacted or even [Rec] so I haven’t been exposed to the “other” POV movies, so this one seemed relatively fresh to me. And the motivations for the camera being used and the reason for it being there just made sense. It’s even referenced in the movie itself with some of his friends telling Jason to put the camera down but then finding that when they are left in control of a camera they find it impossible to stop filming as well.
There are some very neat tricks as well. At one point the group of friends pull into a garage in their winnebago, and you see it from the point of view of a security camera. For a moment I was thinking “Oh God, you’ve gone and blown it now”, as why would it have security camera footage but then in a scene not long after Jason takes some time out to edit some footage together and upload it to the internet, and one of his friends provides him with the security camera footage as he has pulled it off of the computer it’s on, which just makes perfect sense! As does the fact that they find another camera and start using that as well, thus giving Romero the luxury of being able to give you alternate angles of the same scene.
The thing is though, that it never once feels out of place when the movie does offer these “alternate camera angles”. They make sense, and it makes sense that a film student would want to embellish an account of the undead. And at least there were no moments like the “pen-camera” from My Little Eye that had me rolling my eyes in disbelief!
The script, for the most part, feels natural enough although there are some lines that are “obvious” lines, if that makes sense. Like “I told you dead things move slowly!”, which while it did make me laugh felt more than a little like Romero’s answer to all the quick moving zombie movies we’ve seen lately.
The cast, who were all pretty unknown to me (not to say that they are all unrecognizable – I just couldn’t have told you what a lot of them had been in before!), did do a pretty good job and for the most part they were believable in their roles of panicked urgency as society crumbles around them. The shift into killing zombies comes naturally enough, and there are some lovely character touches as the cast gets wittled down.
And then there are the zombie deaths. George A Romero is the man when it comes to zombies, if you ask me. Mention a zombie movie and chances are one of his will pop into my head, and I am happy to say that there are some superbly realised and imaginative zombie deaths in this movie. Personal favourite? It’s honestly a toss up between the defibrulator and the scythe.
This was meant to be a small movie, with George A Romero returning to his roots and taking a different look at the Dead world that he created, while making another comment on society and the interntet/MySpace/YouTube generation and it has to be said…it’s great! I truly did enjoy this movie. It is superbly directed, deftly filmed with excellent use of the two camera’s, well scripted and has some tense moments, some funny, but all entertaining.
As this is the Blu-Ray release, the picture quality is pretty superb. The movie was filmed on hi-def video cameras, and this shows throughout the clarity that is allowed through Blu-Ray. Yes, sometimes the picture is a little dark but I actually think that that was part of the plan, but for the most part it looks great.
Extras
Audio Commentary with George A Romero, Editor Michael Doherty and Director of photography Adam Swica: This is an entertaining and interesting chat track, with lots of technical information coming from Romero, Doherty and Swica regarding the making of the movie, as they discuss the challenges of making certain shots look like one continuous take, Doherty points out some of the places it’s been “cheated” and Romero discusses at some length how the movie ties into reality. All in all, a very entertaining and enlightening chat track which is well worth a listen.
Master of the Dead: George Romero (13 min): These five featurettes make up one big Making Of, that clocks in at 78 minutes, and covers everything from the conception of the idea for the movie, through to the effects and make-up etc and does give a very detailed look into the making of the movie. The only weak point, if there is one, is the Into The Camera: The Cast section where seven of the cast members talk about their involvement with the movie and use the time to discuss their characters. But apart from that, this is a great documentary!
Into the Camera: The Cast (16 min 50s):
You Look Dead!: Make-up Effects (10 min 40s):
A New ‘Spin’ on Death: Visual Effects (18min 44s):
A World Gone Mad: Photography and Design (20 min):
Character Confessionals (20 min 27s): Four of the cast filmed these ad-libbed “video diaries” in character – and prove that it’s very lucky that they weren’t allowed to ad-lib their way through the movie!
The First Week: A Visit to the Set (4 min 13s): A video diary made by independant filmmaker Michael Felsher during the first week of making the movie, during which time they were doing most of the outside shooting. Fairly pointless really, but it is funny in places.
The Roots (1 min 50s): This is a very short interview with Romero discussing the origins of the story, and really should have been included in the Master of the Dead sequence, but it is still interesting to here the man talk about zombies.
Familiar Voices (5 min): This presents, in unedited audio, the ISDN phone line recording sessions between Guillermo del Toro, Simon Pegg and Stephen King as they recorded “audio cameos” for the movie. Apparently there are a lot more scattered throughout the movie, with people like Tarantino and others mentioned in the commentary.
Idea For Diary Of The Dead (20 min): This is a UK exclusive interview from Frightfest 2008 where Romero talks about the background of Diary, how he wanted to step back from the extravagences of Land of the Dead and make a smaller movie, where the ideas came from and how the movie grew. Yes, it has been covered in some of the other featurettes but Romero always seems listenable to and this is still an interesting interview.
Speak Of The Dead (15 min): This is an interview from the Bloor Cinema in Toronto in 2007 where Romero talks about his early influences, his directorial debut and some of the movies that followed his appearance in the 1970′s. Very interesting, and certainly worth a watch.
All in all, this is a fabulous return to form for George A Romero. I have always loved the Dead movies, and was hoping that this one would be just as good as the rest but it is quite possibly Romero’s best movie in years, and certainly is better than Land Of The Dead. The transfer on the Blu-Ray is superb and the disc is rammed with some quality extras. If you are a fan of zombie movies then you really should pick this up.
4 Responses to “[BLU-RAY Review] DIARY OF THE DEAD”
I still have yet to see this. I’m worried, I’ve heard it’s not that good. I’ll get to it eventually.
Also, you guys across the pond don’t get the MySpace short films on the DVD? That sucks, they winning ones were quite good, I really liked the one from Teller of Penn & Teller fame.
Wyv beat me to the punch on the review for this one. All I will say is that “four” may be a bit much but it is a GOOD film, honest. It’s as filled with ambition and original concept as it is with weaknesses!
I also liked Diary of The Dead. It was produced on a 2 mil budget so its scope is small. It works as a nice companion piece to Romero’s original Night Of The Living Dead.If your expectations are kept in check, it definetly is worth seeing.
His Dawn Of The Dead is still the Gone With The Wind of the genre!
The sequel was announced last month.
I got excited until I realised that I’d read two sentences in the same article as one whole sentence – so it was referring to a new Rene Zelwegger AND a new George A Romero movie.
Damn, I really thought BRIDGET JONES’ DIARY OF THE DEAD had potential!
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