Night of the Living Dead (1968)
★★★½ — Night of the Living Dead (1968)
George Romero was a Pittsburgh-based commercial director with virtually no feature film experience when he co-wrote and directed this on a shoestring budget of around $114,000, pooled together by a small group of local investors trading as Image Ten. Shot in black and white in and around Evans City, Pennsylvania across 1967, the film borrowed liberally from Richard Matheson's 1954 novel I Am Legend (which had already been adapted once, as The Last Man on Earth in 1964), though Romero's flesh-eating ghouls quickly took on a life of their own. The casting of Duane Jones, a Black actor, in the lead role was quietly radical for 1968, a year of extraordinary racial tension in America. The film entered public domain almost immediately due to a copyright error, which limited Romero's earnings but ensured its near-universal circulation.
I first watched the colour version of this on a VHS I bought at a charity shop on holiday in Cornwall as a 10 year old boy. A masterpiece. Pure, unfiltered horror history. It’s almost impossible to overstate the impact of Night of the Living Dead. Without it, the modern zombie genre simply would not exist. No 28 days later, no The Walking Dead, no Resident Evil. The world would be zombie-less, and that’s just crazy to think about. George A. Romero didn’t just make a great horror movie, he created an entire genre. The idea of undead, flesh-eating corpses rising from the grave all starts right here. And the fact that the film fell into the public domain because of a clerical error is absolutely wild. One of the most influential films of all time, and anyone can just… use it. Remake it. Sell it. Show it. The idea that such a culturally defining piece of cinema was left unprotected is both tragic and kind of poetic. The film itself is still terrifying. (My girlfriend won't rewatch this as it frightened her so much). The bleak, grainy black-and-white cinematography gives it an almost documentary feel, making everything seem unnervingly real. The performances are fantastic across the board, but Duane Jones is on another level. He’s calm, commanding, and effortlessly cool that gives the film a gravitas that so many ‘60s horror movies lacked. His performance alone makes this worth watching. And that ending… my god. No happy endings here, just pure, nihilistic horror. Even nearly 60 years later, it still hits like a punch to the gut. Iconic, chilling, legendary.
Rating: ★★★½ | Year: 1968 | Watched: 1999-03-03
Where to watch (UK)
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Related on Movies With Macca
More from George A. Romero: Creepshow (1982) · Jacaranda Joe (2022) · BIOHAZARD 2 TV-CM (1997) · Survival of the Dead (2009)
More from the 1960s: Viy (1967) · Persona (1966) · Carnival of Souls (1962) · Daisies (1966)
More horror: Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956) · Viy (1967) · Nightmare City (1980) · Angst (1983)
More thriller: Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956) · Angst (1983) · The Long Walk (2025) · Punishment Park (1971)
