I don’t like sitting with my back to a window: that’s where zombies and other assorted ghouls get in. Wherever I live, I make a point of not putting any kind of loungy furniture in front of a window; not a couch, not a chair, not a bed. I’m a reasonable person and I know that George Romero’s walking dead zombies aren’t real, but that isn’t stopping me from being scared and unable to sleep right now.
I’ve seen a ton of zombie movies, including Romero’s Dawn of the Dead, but had never seen Night of the Living Dead until this week. I’m trying to figure out what it is about that left me so uneasy, whereas other movies could just be shrugged off without disturbing my sleep at all.
Part of it is that there was real tension in Night of the Living Dead. I wasn’t manipulated by a soundtrack. I wasn’t manipulated by false scares. Romero built and maintained a steady atmosphere of terror without cheap tricks.
Romero’s zombies were so quiet. The black and white film subdued a lot of the graphic stuff, which let my mind fill in any blanks. My mind always goes to the worst place. Most of it takes place inside a house; how often do we really know what’s going on outside our own homes? The blinds and doors in my house are closed as I write this. It’s quiet outside, but there could be ten zombies in the courtyard and I wouldn’t know unless I looked or they crashed through the window.
Romero doesn’t really give us anyone to root for. We want people to live, because getting eaten alive is pretty sucky, but we know little about the characters. Barbara had the most back story, and even that was limited. We don’t know where anyone else came from, why they were in the area, or exactly how they came to be in the house.
After the movie, I had to get out of the living room because I kept seeing the white, hanging planter reflected in the TV screen and my mind turned it into a looming zombie head. Even though it’s getting warm at night here, I closed and locked the doors, but I kept glancing at the back door. Then John started randomly wandering around the house in zombie fashion, head lolling, limbs stiff. At one point he had me cornered in the kitchen in zombie stance, wielding a plant mister and it really freaked me out.
I’m thirty years old and feel pretty stupid for feeling like this. But, Night of the Living Dead scared me when nothing really does anymore. And that’s pretty cool.
Lisa Fary's earliest influences are Princess Leia, Rainbow Bright, Astronaut Barbie, and her 6th grade teacher, Ms. Palmer. She's angry that it's 2011 and she still doesn't have a hovercraft, but will accept a jetpack as consolation. That jetpack had better be pink with a rhinestone monogram. 
The fact that you're review of Night of the Living Dead is not taking place within the narrow parametors of Halloween is refreshing! It's a true cult classic. And you are right to be scared shitless! Sometimes it is better not to watch Night of the Living Dead with other people because they tend to try to scare the crap out of you while you're watching it. Of course that is part of the fun isn't it. ::grins:: But I don't think I could ever watch it alone because I would end up sleeping with the lights on and make my boyfriend stay on the phone with me while I sleep. ::I might be kidding here, not quite sure ha ha::
When I first saw Night of the Living Dead. I WAS DEAD! I’d been mowed down in a freak cotton bud related incident (KEEP THEM DRY FOR THE SAKE OF THE CHILDREN IF NOTHING ELSE!!). And I had then awoken to find myself one of the walking dead.
On watching the film I was immediately horrified about how the, so called, living treat my fellow brain eating amigos. The movie is Romero’s (also a zombie) record of oppression and brutality rained down upon my people in the name of, so called, ‘self preservation’ and ‘life’.
Well! Excuse us for making a life style choice that doesn’t agree with your political and, so called, moral stance!! Leaning a little bit to The Right are you!!!?? Just because we often choose to wear our pancreas OUTSIDE our body that’s no need to blow apart our craniums and pitchfork us onto a bonfire. SURE we may tear you children limb from limb to feed our base, bestial urges but what’s with sticking a load of shotgun toting, dungaree wearing, sister loving HICKS on our rotting (but still quite pert) asses!!!???
SO I wrote a stiff letter of protest (GETTIT? HAHAHAHA!! I’m killing me here!! WOKA WOKA WOKA!!!) and was going to post it to our then, so called, Prime Minster John Major. BUT I was ran down by an ambulance and was revived at one of OUR wonderfully hard working (and free – YOU SUCKERS!!) National Health hospitals.
Obviously, now I am living again, I would stove a dead-head’s head in with a toaster let alone look at one. BUT I have seen both sides of the coin and, if I may, I will leave you with a few, so called, words of wisdom.
They may stink. But please think.
They may be disintegrating. But that’s no reason to be discriminating.
They may be putrefying. But that’s no reason to… um… not return their Die Hard box set.
Thank you.