Zombie need fighting
By John Esther
Once again George A. Romero directs viewers to another part of America where mass zombies roam the land, threatening to eat any humans they can slowly catch.
The six film of his kind, Romero’s absurdly titled Survival of the Dead sets itself between Philadelphia and Plum Island –- off the coast of Delaware. (The film was shot in Canada). Here, apparently an Irish homestead bordering on incest, two families are fussing and feuding about how to deal with them undead folk. Most of the O’Flynn’s, lead by Patrick O’Flynn (Kenneth Welsh), have no time thinking about fixing people who might be the only ones on earth more challenged than the O'Flynns while the other dimwitted and more populous family, the Muldoons, led by Shamus Muldoon (Richard Fitzpatrick), have taken it as a god given right to quarantine the zombies until they find a cure.
After Patrick is ostracized from the island he sets up a trap to reel in humans and get their supplies by any mean and ornery ways necessary. A band of smarmy soldiers and Boy (Devon Bostick) in an armored truck full of cash are the latest would-be victims of Patrick, but they have enough ammo and audacity to turn the hunter into the hunted. After all being betrayed yet one saved by Patrick, Boy, Sarge (Alan Van Sprang), Tomboy (Athena Karkanis) and Francisco (Stefano Di Matteo) decide to head back to Plum Island with Patrick.
Back on the island, it does not take long before one human by the dozen zombies are slaughtered one way or another until the surviving few decide to leave the island -- although there is no indication the island will be any less safe than returning to the mainland.
Zombies kill humans, humans kill zombies, humans kill humans, but zombies do not kill zombies, and thus writer-director Romero’s tepid commentary on our belligerent times offers little in the way of cultural value. Sometimes it offers a few mild observations, occasionally humorous ones, too. But most of it is flimsy filmmaking. The film does not bother to explain how the undead came to exist. Ipso facto, the existence of zombies is just another situation for a bunch of undereducated and misinformed Americans to quibble over.
And why does it always take a blow to the brain to get rid of a zombie for good? A better and longer lasting solution to brain damage would be finding a way to end corporation misinformation and mercury poisoning while not playing violent kill zombie video games or patronizing mind-numbing “horror” films.
