Diary of the Dead reviewed

From AICN, First off, enough with this bullshit about DIARY OF THE DEAD being CLOVERFIELD with zombies. It just isn't. George Romero's latest and most radically different zombie tale is not meant to be found footage; it's meant to be the equivalent of a finished, edited, even scored student film (entitled "The Death of Death" if you must know) chronicling the early days of a zombie rising and takeover. In other words, Romero is starting from square one, and he's curious how young people (in this case, a group of student filmmakers and actors) would react as it dawned on them that the world is essentially doomed. In Romero's original NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD, people turned to the radio and television for updates and speculation. Here, they go to cell phones and the Internet, where people post thousands of homemade videos of zombies attacking and being killed. And of course, people would want to document as much as they could with camcorders.

Romero relies on a group of largely unknown actors to tell his story, which certainly sells the believability factor (what there is) and keeps us guessing as to who survives to see the end of this film (if anyone). As a straight-up zombie picture, DIARY OF THE DEAD is a worthy Romero effort. It spooked me consistently and the ways in which zombies and the living are killed or maimed are pretty spectacular, thanks to makeup guru Gregory Nicotero and his crew. There's a sequence set inside an abandoned hospital that truly freaked me out, and the weapon of choice for the professor who tags along with the group of students as they drive to safety is inspired. Thankfully, Romero doesn't skimp on the violence. Romero also hasn't lost his gift for politicizing the zombie phenomenon. He still takes swings at the military, as well as police brutality, government cover-ups, the lack of response after Hurricane Katrina, anti-immigration pundits and the media.

Many of the criticisms of the film focus on the acting, and as much as I enjoyed the hell out of DIARY OF THE DEAD, I can't disagree that most of the acting is pretty bad. When you go with a cast of unknowns, this is a risk you run. And were the rest of the film not so strong, the piss-poor acting might have sunk this ship. It may be too close to call for some, and you may give up early. But have faith that Romero does deliver the zombified goods when it comes to blood and guts. And please don't think that George has completely given up featuring a few famous folks in the mix; be sure to listen carefully to the random "voices of reason" that come sporadically throughout the film from the TV or radio or Internet. A handful of them might sound very familiar. The film's final act is set in a mansion, and some of the goings on there seem a little too outrageous even for a film about the living dead, but by that point, I was fully on board. DIARY OF THE DEAD has its flaws, but Romero has simply set the bar so high with his other walking-corpse movies that it may feel like this one falls short. Make no mistake: It's still a solid work of horror from an unqualified master.