Morning Edition

Zombies: Still Undead, And Suddenly Everywhere

By Beth Accomando

Published July 1, 2009 10:25 AM

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George A. Romero certainly didn't invent zombies, but with his 1968 cult classic Night of the Living Dead, he created a lasting cinematic mythology for them.

In Romero's taxonomy of horror, zombies are undead creatures that feed on human flesh. If they bite you, you die — and then return from the dead, a zombie yourself.

Though certainly not the first zombie film, George Romero's 1968 Night of the Living Dead established these staggering, flesh-eating antagonists as a horror-movie staple — and a cultural obsession.

"Rule 1 for zombies: You have to want to kill people," says horror screenwriter Kirsten Elms. "You have to want to rip someone's throat out — it doesn't matter if they are your mother or your wife or your dog."

The simple but satisfying explanation Romero offered for their existence? That when "there's no more room in hell, the dead will walk the Earth."

The book Pride and Prejudice and Zombies adds an incongruous twist to Jane Austen's stately satire. "Every page seemed to have something that was subconsciously put there by Jane Austen to be twisted into a gory zombie-fest," author Seth Grahame-Smith told All Things Considered.

And there's only one way to stop them: Take off their heads.

Naturally, they've proven immensely popular.

They're highly adaptable, for one thing, serving as apt metaphors for everything from racism (in Night of the Living Dead) to science gone wrong (in 28 Days Later).

Plus, they're fun to kill — hence a new crop of Nazi zombies, on parade in the Norwegian film Dead Snow. (It's screening in New York, and available on demand from cable's IFC In Theaters channel.)

Dead Snow's rotting storm troopers are just one phalanx in a full-scale zombie invasion, though. Recently, the undead seem to be shuffling aimlessly into every corner of our pop culture.

Borders bookstores feature a wall of zombie literature that runs the gamut from The Zombie Survival Guide to Pride and Prejudice and Zombies to Zombie Haiku.

The undead have even infected our language and the way we talk about things. Zombie banks? Check. But have you heard of a "zombie process?" Maybe if you're a tech geek.

"In my field, if it's 'zombified,' it's a zombie process," says IT architect Kevin Workman. "That means it's alive, but it's not responding to normal stimuli. It's kind of got a will of its own at that point, and then we got to kill it."

But you can't keep a good zombie down. Staring out from vacant eyes, these undead rise every few years to provide the perfect blank canvas for social commentary. Romero himself reanimated his franchise with 2005's Land of the Dead to criticize the Bush administration.

Phil Luque, programmer for the San Diego Asian Film Festival Extreme, says zombies provide the ideal means of slipping social messages in under the radar.

"If you want to tell somebody, 'I don't like you and I don't like the way you're running the government,' if I can tell it through a zombie movie, they're not going to care," Luque says. "It's just a zombie movie."

Simon Pegg and Edgar Wright paid homage to Romero's socially conscious zombies in their 2004 film Shaun of the Dead.

"We wanted to keep that spirit ... to comment on consumerism," Pegg says. "And in Day of the Dead, on vivisection — and use them as a metaphor."

"Zombies meant different things in different eras," says Wright, who co-wrote and directed Shaun of the Dead. "We always said our zombies are a metaphor for apathy. It's kind of like the great plague is laziness, so it was like the zombies represent sloth."

Zombies are also the perfect faceless villain, says undead fan Trent Reid. They're not alive, and they don't have too many fans, so "[whatever] you do to them doesn't really matter — you can kill them in the most ridiculous graphic ways."

Like in the video games Resident Evil and Left 4 Dead. And parents don't complain about the carnage — at least not the way they did about their kids killing hookers in Grand Theft Auto. If those had been zombie hookers, it'd be a different story.

That's why Call of Duty: World at War, like Dead Snow, opts for Nazi zombies. Gotta love killing them.

But no matter what form these undead take, remember — aim for the head.

Beth Accomando reports for member station KPBS in San Diego.

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DAVID GREENE, host:

These days, just pick your media. You won't find a place to hide. You'll find zombies rising from the dead to greet, or maybe eat you. You can kill zombies in video games. You can read zombie poetry, watch Nazi zombies in the film "Dead Snow," and if Bill Murray's your thing, well, you can wait for the fall when he plays a zombie in a movie with the oh-so-creative title "Zombieland." Beth Accomando of member station KPBS reports on the invasion.

BETH ACCOMANDO: Pop quiz, hot shot. What would you do in a zombie outbreak? Don't panic. We have undead experts Kevin Workman and Kirsten Elms here to help. Question number one: How do you become a zombie?

Mr. KEVIN WORKMAN: If you're bitten, then in a certain amount of time, you will die and then you will come back from the dead.

ACCOMANDO: Correct. Second question: How do you kill a zombie?

(Soundbite of movie, "Shaun of the Dead")

Mr. JEREMY THOMPSON (Newscaster): (as himself) By removing the head or destroying the brain.

ACCOMANDO: Very good. Plus, you get style points if you dispose of them with a chainsaw.

(Soundbite of movie, "Evil Dead 2")

(Soundbite of chainsaw)

Mr. BRUCE CAMPBELL (Actor): (as Ash) Groovy.

ACCOMANDO: And what do zombies need to survive?

Unidentified Woman: Brains.

Unidentified Man #1: Brains only.

Unidentified Woman: Yes.

ACCOMANDO: Mmm, brains good, but so are livers, hearts and intestines.

Ms. KIRSTEN ELMS (Horror Screenwriter): Rule one for zombies: You have to want to kill people. You have to just want to rip someone's throat out - it doesn't matter if they're your mother or your kid, you just want to rip them to pieces.

ACCOMANDO: George A. Romero defined the modern zombie in his 1968 film "Night of the Living Dead." Now zombies are mounting a full-scale invasion, shuffling aimlessly into every corner of our pop culture. At Borders, zombie literature runs the gambit from "The Zombie Survival Guide" to "Pride and Prejudice and Zombies" to "Zombie Haiku."

Unidentified Man #2: My rigor mortis is mainly why I'm slower, and the severed foot.

ACCOMANDO: Staring out from vacant eyes, these undead provide the perfect blank canvas for social commentary.

Mr. PHIL LUQUE (Programmer, San Diego Asian Film Festival Extreme): If you want to be able to tell somebody, hey, I don't like you and I don't like the way you're running the government, I don't like that you're corporation is doing this, if I can tell it through a zombie movie, they're not going to care. They'll be like, oh, it's just a zombie movie.

ACCOMANDO: Phil Luque points out that Romero uses them to comment on racism in "Night of the Living Dead" and then reanimated them in "Land of the Dead."

(Soundbite of movie, "Land of the Dead")

Unidentified Man #3: Trouble?

Mr. DENNIS HOPPER (Actor): (as Kaufman) In a world where the dead are returning to life, the word trouble loses much of its meaning.

ACCOMANDO: These zombies raged against Dennis Hopper's George Bush-like leader. But zombies took on new meaning in Edgar Wright's "Shaun of the Dead" in 2004.

Mr. EDGAR WRIGHT (Film and Television Director): Our zombies are the metaphor for apathy. It's kind of like the great plague is laziness. So it's almost like the zombies represent, like, sloth.

(Soundbite of movie, "Shaun of the Dead")

Mr. SIMON PEGG (Actor): (as Shaun) Look, okay, just get any blunt objects together, all right? If you get cornered, bash them in the head. That seems to work out. Keep together, stay sharp and follow me.

ACCOMANDO: Bashing zombies is a favorite past time of video games such as "Resident Evil," "Left 4 Dead," and "Dead Rising," says Trent Reid.

Mr. TRENT REID: Zombies aren't alive, so anything that you do to them doesn't really matter. You can kill them in the most ridiculous, graphic ways.

(Soundbite of gunfire)

ACCOMANDO: And parents don't complain about the carnage the way they did about killing hookers in "Grand Theft Auto." Now if those had been zombie hookers, it would have been a different story. And watch out for Nazi zombies rising from the grave in "Dead Snow" and "Call of Duty: World at War." But no matter what form these reanimated corpses take, just remember, aim for the head.

For NPR News, I'm Beth Accomando.

(Soundbite of music)

GREENE: And if a Norwegian Nazi zombie movie peaks your interest, we've got a review of it and some clips. Go to our Web site: npr.org.

This is MORNING EDITION from NPR News. I'm David Greene.

RENEE MONTAGNE, host:

And I'm Renee Montagne. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright National Public Radio.

Source: NPR

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