Filmmaker George Romero’s death yesterday has a lot of people thinking nostalgically about zombie movies; he essentially made zombie movies into a viable genre with the tense, creepy and disturbing “Night of the Living Dead” (1968).
I first saw it during my tween years. My dad loved horror movies, and couldn’t wait to show it to me. I’m pretty sure my mom protested the idea, but I was too enthusiastic about the idea of seeing the “scariest movie ever” to let her veto stick.
There was nothing that could have prepared me for “Night of the Living Dead.” No other movie I’d seen before felt like it. The movie was relentless, claustrophobic and brutal. The fact that it was shot in black and white made it somehow creepier. The handheld camerawork made it all the more uncomfortable.
The zombies were savage. At one point, my dad drove the point home: “They’re eating the intestines!” Yep. They sure were. Romero underscored the horror with terrifying imagery.
I’ve seen and loved plenty of zombie movies since (“28 Weeks Later” and “Train to Busan” both made nice leaps forward for the genre), but it’s the original that left a mark on me. R.I.P. George Romero.