George A. Romero's Land of the Dead

[md]

spoiler:

get down!
(bullet to the head)

[socketlevel]

you guys seem to know there is going to be a director's cut?  was there word on this or something?

-sl-

[grand theft sparrow]

He briefly mentioned something about it on the IFC special.

[MacGuffin]

you guys seem to know there is going to be a director's cut?  was there word on this or something?

-sl-

*Sigh* No one reads the articles I post.

Romero is busily assembling the unrated DVD edition, so although the R-rated theatrical release has plenty of the crunchy, squishy, visceral extravagance that is the hallmark of a "Dead" movie, the carnage will linger a bit longer for home video.

[socketlevel]

you guys seem to know there is going to be a director's cut?  was there word on this or something?

-sl-

*Sigh* No one reads the articles I post.

i try to man, i try too...

i'm just too lazy to find it...

-sl-

[MacGuffin]

Interview: George A. Romero
We talk to the horror auteur about Land of the Dead.
 
George A. Romero doesn't merely make zombie movies; he invented them. His cult-classic debut Night of the Living Dead remains one of the landmark horror films in the history of cinema, and earned hordes of imitators, three sequels (including this weekend's Land of the Dead) and an official remake. But when it comes to making movies, the filmmaker hardly sounds like the self-important auteur one might expect of an industry elder statesman. Rather, he's still the same even-headed guy who struggles to get his movies made, fights to maintain creative control, and then modestly enjoys their spoils when they succeed; and after an impressive $10 million opening this weekend at the box office, the 65-year-old Romero still has much to celebrate.

On the eve of Land of the Dead's release in theaters nationwide, Romero spoke to IGN to discuss his latest project, which follows in the estimable footsteps of its predecessors as gory, good fun that also happens to be smarter than your average post-apocalyptic zombie flick. As Romero reveals, the process of getting his latest opus to the screen proved even more difficult than with previous efforts; but he says that the commercial-minded timbre of contemporary moviemaking, as much as the larger cultural context, made this Dead one far more worth reviving.

Q: Hi George. Was there any pressure for you, returning to the Dead series after such a long time away from it?

GEORGE A. ROMERO: This is the pressure right here (laughs). There wasn't so much pressure; sort of few and far between. I actually started the idea for this before 9/11. I had this conceit that I did one in the '60s, '70s and then '80s and I missed the '90s because my partner Peter and I wound up in development hell out here. There was about eight years where nothing happened and we couldn't get a movie made. I wound up making more money during that period because I wound up working on all of these high profile projects but they never happened. So I fled and we raised five million bucks and I made a little move called Bruiser that nobody saw, and so I missed the '90s. After licking my wounds from Bruiser I started to write this. I wound up having something I thought was presentable so I sent it around literally a few days before 9/11 and then everybody just wanted to make soft fuzzy movies so I put it on the shelf for about a year and a half and then came back to it with the idea of reflecting this idea of the new normal and the war.

In a way I think it is a much more interesting film now. Initially it was about ignoring the problem and there was [Dennis Hopper's] Kaufman character in there and it was Fiddler's Green and it was more about ignoring social ills like homelessness and AIDS and just telling people, 'Don't worry about it, that's their problem', [but] I think this is more impactful. I don't try to put it right in your face I just try to get it in there. Maybe it's a little too on the nose when he says, 'We don't negotiate with terrorists.' I have to say somebody noticed. A reporter I talked to earlier today said, 'Boy, that truck – when it comes down that little street in that town you just can't help but think of Iraq.' So I guess the stuff does get noticed, but I try not to put it right up in there.

Q: How much pressure did you face trying to update this for modern audiences, and how tough was it to maintain the integrity of the series after so many decades of personal and professional changes?

ROMERO: I don't think necessarily in those terms. The scope of this film was much bigger than anything else so it needed money, although still we weren't rich. We were under twenty million after they threw money at it in order to get it finished after they changed the date. They wound up having to spend more money having everybody working overtime from sound mixers to CG guys, but it's still under twenty and it was still pretty much guerilla filmmaking. On the set there was basically not a big difference; in fact, we were much more relaxed shooting Dawn. We had forty-two days to make this film. The crews were fabulous; the cast were great. Nobody finked out. Everybody was there to do it and it was all night. I think of the forty-two, we only had eight days indoors and it was all night in freezing Toronto weather. So it was very, very hard.

As far as the sensibility, I've sort of made slight stylistic changes in all of them to more reflect the cinematic style of the decade as well as the politics or the social. So that was a conscious decision too. I had a wonderful DP. As far as it fitting into the group, I haven't really changed my attitude toward the zombies. They don't run. I always say that my guys will take out library cards before they join health clubs; I'm more interested in their mental evolution. I also don't find them as threatening when they are running at you. It's like a first person shooter game or something, and I don't find that as threatening. I grew up on the Frankenstein monster and the Mummy, these things that sort of move at you slowly but their hard to stop. You have to find their Achilles' heel. That's just my personal take.
 
Q: You have always had a distinctive take on zombies. What do you see in them that others might not?

ROMERO: I don't think that I necessarily see anything in them. As I say, I like them being personalities. I think that what maybe I've done that I have seen in some other films is that they are not just a pack of people in clothes from The Gap. You can give them personalities with wardrobe. One of the first things that I asked the wardrobe designer to do was to make sure we know who they are, because they're us; they come from different walks of life. I started really doing that with Dawn. It's that but I've always had sort of real characters, real zombie characters from Dawn on. In this case it's shooting them [and] giving them close ups, treating them like real players – which they are. They're not just masses and I was really trying to work with that on this with Big Daddy, and particularly his central core of people that come from the town all have distinct personalities. But I don't know exactly what works and doesn't work. I prefer to let them do their own thing and sometimes you get some outrageous way over the top stuff. So I'll say that's too much or that doesn't work, [but] I don't know. It's all about believability. It's a ridiculous premise to begin with, so how do you keep people from laughing.

Q: Given the illustrious history of this series, there must have been a lot of people eager to work with you like Shaun of the Dead's Simon Pegg and Edgar Wright. Can you talk about the process of assembling this cast?

ROMERO: Well Asia [Argento], I've always thought of Asia because I've known her since she was knee high through her dad, so I went in saying that I would love to use Asia and the studio went along with that. Simon [Baker,] I had never met. He shot a series in Pittsburgh called the Guardian. He was there for three years so we at least had some commonality there. Dennis [Hopper] I'd never worked with or never met either. Again we had that '60s commonality, you know, that frustration. Guess it's too bad it didn't work out (laughs). Easy Rider and Night came out within a year of each other so we had a lot to talk about. Robert Joy I had worked with before. [John] Leguizamo again I was saying right at the beginning of casting, "If we could get someone like John Leguizamo..." Mark Canton arranged a call and it turned out that John knew my work and said 'Yes' right away. I was in hog heaven. This cast really came to work. Nobody was hiding in their trailer. It was a rough, rough shoot. Everybody was right out there crawling around in the mud and doing it. Everybody took it quite seriously. Got it and got the point of it.

Q: What sparked your interest in filmmaking to begin with?

ROMERO: I used to paint. I went to college to study painting and design and found out I wasn't good enough. It was at Carnegie-Mellon and they had a wonderful theater school there so I transferred into that department, but all the while I thought you had to be born into royalty to make movies, even though I had an uncle when I was a kid who had an 8mm camera and I tried to make a couple of little movies of my own but never taking it that seriously. It was just sort of a hobby. And when I was in college schools like Carnegie-Mellon, very few schools had equipment. The class just sat down and watched The Battleship Potemkin and talked about it a lot and that was pretty much it. So I never had any hands-on but I always loved movies forever since I was a kid. Influences I would have to say Michael Powell – probably he's my man – and Orson [Welles].

When I came out of school I left without ever graduating and in those days cities the size of Pittsburgh had film labs. So I just went down and hung out at one of these film labs. My first job as a PA was literally bicycling news; news was on film. These journeyman guys splicing this s**t together while smoking cigarettes over flammable glue pots (laughs). It was like a press room. It was in one of those labs that I learned the basics. Then we started a company to do commercials on film and that's how our little group got together. I always loved movies I just thought that we would never try to do it. I didn't approach it, I didn't try to go out and get a job or anything I guess I always had that audacity to say, "Come on guys!" You know the old thing, 'Hey we can have the dance right here?' And that's how Night of the Living Dead happened.

Q: What do you think you know now as an older filmmaker that maybe you didn't when you made Night of the Living Dead?

ROMERO: Mostly what I have learned has been about craft. I still feel like I am learning. You develop a lot of tricks that you can keep in your hip pocket. I think I know how to move the camera better. I'm more sure of myself. I know if we are pressed for time that I can eliminate this shot or that shot so it still tells a story. It's mostly that and it's also as you get older you get less intimidated. You feel more like you can do what you want to do and worry a little bit less about protocols. You feel more free to just be yourself, which is just something that comes with age.

[Weak2ndAct]

It's not the greatest movie ever.  But-- all considering,  I can't give many gripes.  I got multiple head shots, social critisicism, B-movie goodness, gore galore, plus a mish-mash of all three movies.  Why the flick was released now, and not Halloween-ish is beyond me.

[MacGuffin]

Why the flick was released now, and not Halloween-ish is beyond me.

Originally planned for a Halloween release, Universal bumped up the $18-million film as a sign of confidence in the highly anticipated gorefest. And although early reviews have been raves, Romero says, "I just hope it's not too much of a specialty niche thing. We're sandwiched between 'Batman' and 'War of the Worlds.' Gulp."

[MacGuffin]

I'll be interested to see the inevitable Unrated Director's Cut. I got the feeling this was Romero cutting his film to fit somewhat, with the 90 mintue horror action genre. His trademarkl character development and dialogue seemed a bit muted in places. Some of Riley's lines seemed cut off almost in mid thought.

Land of the Dead on DVD
Romero promises more character development and effects on DVD.

George Romero's Land of the Dead opened this week to a respectable $10 million in box office receipts, so it comes as little surprise that the director is already discussing opportunities not only for the forthcoming DVD, but potential sequels. Describing the inevitable unrated version that will appear on DVD, he confesses that much of the material will be character-building content rather than simply extra gore. "There's a few things," he says. "There is one scene in particular where [John Leguizamo's] Cholo, before he meets [Dennis Hopper's] Kaufman, he goes into a neighboring penthouse and finds a human that hung himself and has to kill him. That was a scene that we felt didn't turn out as effectively as it could have and we didn't think it was necessary so that's really the only major scene from the original script that's gone."

"The DVD version, we are working on it now," he reveals. "I think it's about six minutes longer, but it's all just adding back or putting in some effects that were excised and putting in some little things like little bits of dialogue in existing scenes that we cut out just to tighten the pace. It's mostly that, and that penthouse scene."

Romero says that he employed a few CGI tricks to bypass some of the MPAA's objections to the film's gore for the theatrical cut, but did not indicate whether the shots would be restored for the DVD. "Universal was more willing to pony up a little more dough, [so] we got an extra few days to try and improve on some of the gore things and dance around the MPAA a little bit by doing the shadow thing and smoke thing to indicate what was going on without actually having it in your face."

"I used Kubrick's trick on green screen," he explains. "I shot figures walking by so if there was a particular gory shot I could composite it and walk someone in front of it." He marvels at the MPAA's vigilance when it comes to excising or editing questionable footage. "It's amazing sometimes that the MPAA will do a frame count."

"Like nobody knows what's going on here? If it's eight frames shorter it's okay? But I guess they have to be diligent and that's the only way that they measure it. 'Make that a little shorter so it will be alright'," he says, imitating their response.

Beyond the DVD and its many iterations, Romero says he has a few projects on deck, including the Showtime series Masters of Horror and a potential Dead sequel. "Masters of Horror is something I am hoping to do," he says. "It's going to depend, I guess; it's sort of related to what happens with this. If this opens strong, I might be in a situation where I might have to do another one of these or would be asked to do another one of these right away, in which case I've sort of left the [story open-ended]."

"I'd almost want to make chapter two of the same movie if that happens," he continues. "Just sort of finish the story and I have an idea of where to go with and in my mind just think of them both as one movie. So if that happens I may not be able to do the Masters of Horror."

Although Masters enlisted other horror greats such as John Carpenter, he says that simple timing may prohibit Romero's involvement. "I've been so tied up on this thing that I haven't been able to write a script for [the show], he confesses. "Mick sent me a couple of scripts and a couple of them are pretty nice. I'm still hoping that I can get a couple of weeks and still be able to do that." At the same time, the independent-minded moviemaker reveals he has a few other ideas up his sleeve, even if neither of his immediate interests play out.

"I have a couple of other things that we are working on, but everything would get trumped if they want to do a sequel to this."

[modage]

a sequel?

Land of the Dead 2: Night of the Living Dead Part V

[w/o horse]

On the one hand I'd like to see Twilight of the Dead be the title, on the hand I'd like to not see a movie with 'of the Dead' in the title again.

[socketlevel]

a direct sequel with the same actors would suck dick.  he shouldn't give in to popularity and fuck up the format.  Even if it means another 20 years and he's then 100.

That's scene in mac's post sounds fucking great though.  I hope the director's cut he removes that stupid line "they're looking for a place to live, just like us."

but i'm with you horsey, it should have been dusk of the dead to begin with.  

-sl-

[RegularKarate]

Twilight of the Dead already happened.  It was in the 90s, the movie just never got made.  

The line that you guys hate so much lends itself towards the future of Zombie-land and is very necessary.
The living won't ever defeat the dead, they'll just have to learn how to coexist.  That's the point of that line.

[w/o horse]

Twilight of the Dead already happened.  It was in the 90s, the movie just never got made.

That's what I was saying, I'd like to see that title get used, but at the same time I'd like a new title.  I think we're on the same page.

Also, I don't know why I never came in here and said that this movie was kick ass and exactly what I was hoping for. I think some of you might be being a little hard on Romero.  It's true that he's in a business that people are hard on, but I wouldn't say that Romero is like most filmmakers, he's more layed back and it makes me want to be more layed back.  That's the trade off, and that's what's pleasurable for me.

[socketlevel]

Twilight of the Dead already happened.  It was in the 90s, the movie just never got made.  

The line that you guys hate so much lends itself towards the future of Zombie-land and is very necessary.
The living won't ever defeat the dead, they'll just have to learn how to coexist.  That's the point of that line.

obviously...   i'm an idiot but not a total fucking idiot.

doesn't mean it was written well, or needed at all.

that could have played out with no dialog.  the girl is about to shoot the zombie (the main black guy), and buddy (the protagonist) lifts his hand up and pushes the gun off her mark.

could even be edited, i'm more than sure, from the existing footage.

the way it plays now is too heavy handed, and the lead zombie looks over and they exchange a look of melodramatic appreciation.  not needed.

-sl-

[edit] if romero is laid back and we all give him indie cred (which is good) and he just so happens to change the series into something it's not then you can no longer say, hey it's up to him.  i'm just saying, i love the stand-alone films.  follow a chronology but not specific characters.  the temptation to do this is always the trend, and they try to churn out the same thing to milk it as much as possible.  if any of you are video game fans then you'll know exactly what i mean with final fantasy X, never in the history did square make a direct sequel [like the possibility with land of the dead] to a final fantasy game.   and now, because they did, the series doesn't hold the same classic feel of being happier than a pig in shit when the new final fantasy game comes out.

there are various different kinds of final fantasy games now because it's a cash grab.  they ruined the title's stigma in the process.  look at 2010, arthur c. clarke starts pimping new ones out and a shitty film is made and before you know it it's no longer the strength it once was.

not that it holds any weight (more so that you just don't think i'm rambling for the sake of it) i'm a huge romero fan.  and i liked the film.  not as good as the others but it fills the void i had for so long.  i started the romero thread cause i fucking love this guy's independence and attitude.  it would break my heart to see him bend over a bit so the studios can fuck him a little.  just for a little cash money.  paranoid, yeah maybe i am a little, and by nature a little pessimistic, but alas i see it happen time and time again...