Diary of the Dead (2007)

A solid and contemporary shift to Romero's template of his magnum opus. Just right for the times.

...Hoping the bizarre ways of these strange days will encourage Romero and other filmmakers of his ilk to make further installments in their franchises, and at least get SOMETHING good from all of this crap 2016 America finds itself in...

It was an ok movie. I didn't like that you could only watch it through their camera view. I also didn't like that if you died you became a zombie. Even if you weren't bitten.

"What a piece of trash!" Is what I would like to say about this movie. Because Romero has made it personal and criticized my favorite zombie franchise of all time. Of course, this is not healthy. I do not know the man, and it really is not personal. But I do have the urge to get back at him and his hardcore following that I feel can be quite pretentious when touting his work as some genius social/political commentary. To me, it has never felt like anything special in that area. But at least there was always some quality fun and entertaining characters to enjoy! But I must say that is now gone. I had the slightest hope that there may be something good here (given that it has 61% on Rotten Tomatoes. [A whole 8% better than Bullet Train?!?! Pfft!]) There are a couple characters to enjoy, but nothing you can't find in your average straight-to-SYFY channel Zombie flick. The dialogue was ROUGH. And I spent the whole movie wondering how bad it was actually intending to be. Was it a full-on parody? I don't think so, because it'd be a lot more fun. Was it dead serious? No; then it should be a lot smarter. I will say that the point about our relationship with technology has aged pretty well. People are more obsessed with it now than ever. But it still doesn't make the character's actions reasonable. It is still dumb. And it isn't a unique take. Everything feels one-dimensional and unrealistic. I must not vibe with Romero's style where it feels like he is making his point so bluntly and sacrificing everything else to do so. This is down with the worst of The Walking Dead's worst spin-offs. But possibly still in with the best of the large pool of terrible zombie movies. I mean, a couple of the effects were actually impressive compared to the rest of the film. (I'm Looking at you, Acid-Kill Zombie!) :D So...would I call it a piece of trash? There are much worse zombie movies than this. But there are SO many better ones, too. (Four of his previous works included!) Compared to its older siblings: Yes, it is a big pile of trash stinking up your bin for a week. But as just another zombie movie: It is an expired can of soup. Still trash. But you can throw it out and move on. No biggie. ;D