Survival of the Dead (2009)

If you're a huge horror movie fan or at least a fan of zombie movies in general then I'm sure you're well aware of the name George A. Romero. I myself am a huge fan especially of his earlier work however that being said I in no way mean any disrespect to him with this review. Some of the problems I have with the DVD he is partly responsible for and some he is not. First of all when I put the DVD in the first thing I notice is there are two options. You can either play the movie from the living side or the dead side eagerly I watched the movie through the dead side first hoping that maybe this option had more gore or maybe even an alternate ending. After that I switched it over to the living side and sat through the movie again only to find out that there are absolutely no difference whatsoever. In all honesty I'm completely baffled as to the point of the two different sides unless it's to get somebody gullible like me to sit through the same mediocre movie twice if that's the case it worked out well. That however is not Mr. Romero's fault, for that I blame the company who released the film. Where I can blame Mr. Romero is the plot.

Although it's not a direct sequel to the Diary of the Dead George A. Romero's Survival of the Dead is somewhat related. In the opening scene you're taken back to a scene from Diary of the Dead Where Soldiers board an RV full of college students who were making a documentary of sorts about the zombie apocalypse going on around them and the small group of soldiers take all of their weapons. From there they fill you in on all of the events that lead up to the beginning of Survival of the Dead. While the small group of soldiers search for a safe haven from the horde of zombies wandering the earth they learn from a fellow survivor they save about an Internet signal which has a message describing an island free of zombies. However after arriving they learn this is not exactly the case. In fact the people on the island could no longer part with their loved ones so they try to reform the zombies by teaching them to not eat humans and reintroducing them somewhat back in to society. Not only that but shortly after arriving on the island they realize visitors are not exactly welcome.

The plot itself reads better than it watches and it reminded me a lot of Conquest of the Planet the Apes the way they tried to make the zombies into slaves and do menial tasks. By the time I got to the end of the movie I honestly felt like I had seen it before and unfortunately for Survival of the Dead it's been done better for instance in Shaun of the Dead. I honestly thought Diary of the Dead was a step in the right direction after the atrocity that was Land of the Dead. I know that most of George Romero's zombie movies are supposed to be social commentaries for what's going on in the world at the time but I have no idea what he's trying to say with Survival of the Dead.

As for the acting it really bothered me the way the characters seemed only slightly annoyed at the oncoming zombie apocalypse where everyone they care about is dead. I hate to second-guess George Romero he was the director and knows what he wants but it just seemed like to me there would be some desperation, anger, and fear resonating from the cast. Instead they barely seemed to notice the zombies. It's almost as if somebody wrote the story and then added zombies in later to spice it up but didn't tell the actors

I was surprised to see that Greg Nicotero was the special effects producer because in the past I've always thought his work was outstanding and let's face it being that it's a zombie movie you expect to see tons of gore. You also expect to see zombies mutilated in just about every way possible. Instead what you get is zombies that barely even look like zombies. I don't know I had really high hopes and was severely disappointed. I've been waiting over a year to watch Survival of the Dead and honestly now I hope this is the last film in Romero's dead franchise whatever magic he had with Night, Dawn, and Day seems to have disappeared. For that reason I give Survival of the Dead 2/5 stars