Will you wait here till I come back to life?

Just a month before we lost the great Tobe Hooper, we also lost the man that inspired Hooper to make horror movies in the first place, George Romero. Romero's Night of the Living Dead ushered in a whole new way of making horror films, not to mention a whole new type of monster: the shuffling, flesh-hungry zombie. Up until Night of the Living Dead came out in 1968, zombies were usually reanimated henchmen doing the bidding of an evil overlord. Romero's zombies weren't doing anyone's bidding except their own. They wanted to eat your brains just for the love of eating your brains.

George Romero and his creations.

Night of the Living Dead and its sequels also introduced a new level of socio-politial commentary that hadn't previously been present in horror films, or at least not to the degree Romero emphasized it. His films addressed racism, consumerism, and the general dark underbelly of American culture. This is largely because, as he has said, he decided not to make the monsters exotic, but to make them our neighbors instead. Part of what makes his films so horrifying is that we are not just watching the evil deeds of monsters, but the evil deeds of ourselves. 

After hundreds of bad DVD and VHS transfers due to its public domain status, Night of the Living Dead has finally gotten the love it deserves with a new 4K restoration completed by MoMA and The Film Foundation. Luckily, George Romero saw it before his death and gave it his seal of approval. He said it was as close as we can get to a definitive version of the film. The new restoration premieres in NYC this Friday (the 13th!) at Film Forum, and will be playing in other theaters throughout the country as well. Janus has bought the film for distrubution, which means it's very likely that Night of the Living Dead will become part of the Criterion Collection. Not bad for a little black and white horror movie filmed on the cheap in rural Pennsylvania with unknown actors.

Today's song, "George Romero," is a tribute to the man (and a few other horror legends) by the indie pop band Sprites. They put to music what we're all thinking when we watch a George Romero movie--what would I do if I was trapped inside a mall with zombies pounding at the door? I know what I'd do--swipe all the Night of the Living Dead Criterion DVDs (which will exist by the time the zombie apocalypse comes), and throw all the annoying people trapped with me to the munchers outside.