Dawn of the Dead-
Unrated Director's Cut
(German PAL Region 2 DVD)
(2004)
review by Billion$Baby

So Night Of The Living Dead was remade by Tom Savini, Dawn Of The Dead was remade by Zack Snyder, and Day Of The Dead was remade by Danny Boyle. ;) It's a bloody good job that Romero is now making Land Of The Dead otherwise the evil God Of Remakes might go hungry through a lack of zombie flick sacrifices. I pretty much hated Snyder's remake when I saw it at the cinema - if you've got the Michael Bay sized balls to carry the same title as an all-time classic genre movie, you'd better deliver something that's above par. P.S. I liked the TCM remake.

Having zombies that go "Waughhh!!!" and run around like Olympic gold medalists with their arms outstretched in the air doesn't help your case much! I've already seen that in Lenzi's Nightmare City which was almost as funny as Snyder's entry. At least in Boyle's far more intelligent take on this idea, the "infected" are rather spasticated, they don't move normally and hence look genuinely threatening. Please take note Snyder. Plus this film is chocka full of cardboard cut-out characters that I couldn't give a shit about. Nothing too wrong with that EXCEPT that we have to undergo formulated and excrutiatingly lengthy, soap opera style scenes that I suspect are meant to tug on my heartstrings instead of managing to bore me to tears (ie, when a huge song and dance is made about deciding what to do with Frank, aka Max Headroom, when the none too bright nurse chick finally works out that zombie bites are actually rather a bad thing).

There's a few good ideas in here. Namely the zombie baby, some cameos from stars of the original, and the communication with signs on the roof top, and I'd be lying if I said that the film doesn't have a great 15 min finale. There's also a nice shot where the camera pans up over the mall roof to show all of the zombies hanging around the sides of the building. But all of the amusing shots where the zombies peg it around like Jesse Owens really destroyed those good moments for me. If the critters just staggered around en masse, I think I'd have really loved this flick too. Amazing how much of a difference that 28 Days Later inspired idea has made, and how it's ultra poor execution has badly affected this film. What a shame...

If you did enjoy this remake, then this more violent version will certainly deliver the goods for ya. This more gorey incarnation of the film raises it from a two to three star film by my reckoning. Bar a few select moments and ideas, the gore is the only thing that keeps the film worthwhile and is why I'll be keeping this film in my collection. What are the differences between this unrated cut and the theatrical version? Well, look out for a bare breasted actress wandering around at the start of the outbreak, extra zombie appearances, an ultra violent version of the wooden stake thru zombie head kill, a rather weird addition of a character admitting that he's gay in an amusing comedic sequence, a shit-load of very enjoyable extra headshots including an extremely violent head vs shotgun standout moment, and the chainsaw accident is much more graphic in this cut of the film!

Bar the cover's language, this German dvd release appears to be EXACTLY the same (English language menus) as the forthcoming US home release. Assuming that you'll be buying the Unrated widescreen version of course. Is there actually any genre fan out there that wants the full-frame theatrical cut that Universal are bizarrely deciding to release at the same time??? Somehow I just can't see that version selling too many copies!! The sad news for UK folks is that our forthcoming release appears to be the Rated version of the film...so even if they're not multi-region, they'd be be wise to order this German region 2 Unrated release instead. As expected the widescreen anamorphic print is excellent and the 5.1 sound packs a punch. Sadly no dts here.

The extras are decent but not great. Irritatingly, there's nothing on making the actual film, just featurettes on making the zombies and the gore effects. Silly. Anyways, you'll get:

- A commentary by Snyder & Eric Newman. Personally I found their statements rather moronic at times.

- "Andy's Last Days Revealed." Exclusive (woo hoo) blair witch style camcorder footage of Andy that was supposedly found over at the gun shop. Lasts 16 painful minutes. I found this VERY embarassing.

- 21 minutes of news reports featured in the film. Not that good either. Okay, I will admit that it's good for laughing at if nothing else - probably best left in the background of the film if you ask me.

- 11 mins of deleted footage with optional commentary.

- "Raising The Dead." 8 mins on the look of the zombies.

- "Attack Of The Living Dead." Another 7 mins on zombie effects.

- "Anatomy Of Exploding Heads." Pretty self explanatory. Lasts 6 mins.

- A Shaun Of The Dead trailer. I liked this homage film more than Snyder's btw!

See what I mean about the extras? Nothing on shooting the actual film - what's up with that?! A very strange state of affairs. Fairly good but sometimes very embarassing extras for a fairly good, sometimes very embarassing film, I suppose that it makes perfect sense really. If nothing else, I take my hat off to Universal for releasing an Unrated version of this remake, well done chaps! Mind you, this film of yours sure needed it...