Random musing

[kefkaroth]

I was thinking today about symbolism used in film, and came upon the zombie subject. It's pretty well known what the old shambling zombie symbolizes, fear of losing your individuality, become one of the masses etc. Or possibly an uprising of the weak, unwashed masses overtaking the upper class

Comments

[yuushi]

The creator of the flesh-eating zombie genre, George A, Romero used zombies for several metaphors. Listen to his rundown of the original Night of the Living Dead

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lf_b54bs8ps

And for the sequel Dawn of the Dead

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A_chNLf2OqI

Don't have a clip for it, but there's also the third movie, Day of the Dead where the zombies have completely taken over the world, outnumbering humans 400,000 to 1. While there are other themes like Racism in Night, consumerism in Dawn, military might in Day by far the theme that connects them all, is that the zombies aren't the real threat, the threat is the fact that people can't work together to save themselves. The biggest threat to ourselves IS ourselves.

[kefkaroth]

That was very cool, I figured you'd be the first to reply :D

That last sentence in the second video is what I was curious about though "They're not fast, they're not strong, they're not smart.. theres just so many of them"

Maybe it's harder to look for symbolism without the context of the movie around it, but it seems changing that aspect of zombies to the super fast, strong zombies might change a lot of the meaning

???

[alilamba]

What I remember from my ONE horror class (it did not help my aversion to the genre - but booze did) was that it was all about being on the grid. That and forcing ourselves to examine our own mortality.

But I think with movies like 28 Days Later (it's funny we were also talking about fast/slow zombies last night) it's really just about being a monster. Just something scary.

I think anyway. Again, I don't really remember much from that class.