Return Of The Living Dead
Starring: Clu Gulager, James Karen, Don CalfaDirector: Dan O'Bannon
Year of Release: 1985
Classic ’80s zombie movie! When we were kids and starving for any view of punk culture in the mainstream, this movie was perfect.
A group of “punk rock” kids break into a cemetery to hang out and wait for their friend who works at a medical supply warehouse next door. The warehouse happens to have a chemical that can raise the dead and of course it gets loose and floods the cemetery. The dead rise and they need brains… lots of brains. What I love about this movie is that even though the punk kids are cliche and kind of cheesy, they have a tongue-in-cheek playfullness and are never treated like bad people. I’m reminded a little bit of some of the characters from Repo Man. It’s got a similar vibe. And having The Cramps, TSOL, and The Damned on the soundtrack adds a lot of credibility. I also like how the zombies have a sense of humor about them. This isn’t the highest budget flick and the zombies are mostly just covered in mud, but they are this crazed mob that just swarms everything that comes into cemetery, even when the zombies call the cops themselves to get more cops to come. The ending is pure ’80s nihilism too as the government simply nukes a major city to solve the problem.
This was OUR zombie movie and it’s brilliant.
