Few horror films have ever cast a shadow as long and enduring as Night of the Living Dead, the 1968 classic directed by George A. Romero and written by Romero and John A. Russo. Though it wasn’t the first zombie film ever made, it is the film that launched an entire subgenre of horror, fueling stories ranging from Romero and Russo’s own dueling sets of sequels to Shaun of the Dead, World War Z, and the perennially popular The Walking Dead.
So why on Earth would you remake it?
In 1990, Romero and Russo re-teamed, for the first time in two decades, to do exactly that, with special effects legend Tom Savini on board as director for what would be the official re-imagining of Night of the Living Dead, this time in color. The response was decidedly mixed at the time, but over the years, the 1990 version of Night has won its fair share of fans, and keeps gaining new ones. Now, it’s streaming on SYFY, and you can see for yourself why the film, like the monsters of its title, refuses to die.
Why 1990’s Night of the Living Dead is worth it
The remake of Night of the Living Dead exists because, at least initially, Romero and Russo were hoping to make a little money off their highly influential zombie property. Yes, they’d both made successful sequels (Romero with Dawn of the Dead and Day of the Dead and Russo with his Return of the Living Dead series), but due to a titling error in the original film, it had fallen into the public domain upon release, leading to rights issues and court battles in an effort to get some of the profits. By the time the rights were untangled, there was simply no money left to be had, leaving Romero and Russo with the option of making their own “official” remake after numerous unofficial remakes and sequels had populated the zombie cinema world.
With Russo and Russell Streiner (who played Johnny in the original Night and served as an executive producer) on board to produce, Romero reworked his and Russo’s original screenplay, updating certain elements for the modern day, tightening up some of the drama between characters, and even tweaking the ending for a new conclusion that’s, in its own way, just as brutal as the original. Savini was eager to sign up for makeup effects, as he hadn’t been around to work on the original film, but Romero encouraged him to go a step further and climb into the director’s chair.
Savini agreed, and assembled an ensemble cast led by Tony Todd as Ben, Patricia Tallman as Barbara, and Tom Towles as the selfish, paranoid Harry Cooper. Structurally, the film is almost exactly the same as the original: Barbara goes to visit her mother in the cemetery, gets attacked by zombies, and flees to a nearby farmhouse, where she encounters Ben, Harry, and other survivors as they hole up in the house for the night and try to keep out the zombie mob.
So, what sets the film apart? The first and most obvious thing is the look, which extends particularly to Savini’s specialty of makeup effects. The gore in the 1990 Night is much more advanced, visceral, and upsetting than much of what you see in the 1968 version, simply because makeup effects had come a long way in the ensuing 22 years, and because a bigger budget meant Savini could pour on more gore. But that’s far from the only reason to see this version of the film.
Within the structure of Night of the Living Dead, a structure with which horror fans everywhere are intimately familiar, Savini’s film — with the help of a great lead performance by Todd, in his pre-Candyman era — becomes a meditation on how few things have changed since the tensions of the 1960s. People are still fragile, terrified, brutal beings who will do terrible things if it means another moment alive, and Romero’s new script does an excellent job playing up those tensions in new ways. This time around there’s a particular focus on the way the men in the room think of Barbara as a helpless woman, only to later find that she’s capable of much more than they imagined. Tallman rises to the occasion with a gripping performance, and when paired with Todd, they’re incredibly watchable.
Is Night of the Living Dead 1990 a better film than Night of the Living Dead 1968? Probably not, but it’s hard to get out of the shadow of a revered classic like that one, with its slinky shadows and visceral focus on the chaos of the moment. That aside, though, this is a horror remake well worth seeing, not just because it manages to make you squirm, but because it exists as a fascinating piece in conversation with its predecessor.
Night of the Living Dead is now streaming on SYFY.
