Dawn of the Dead original and remake comparison

The film Dawn of the dead is set in a world that is overrun by the Dead and survivors seek refuge in a shopping mall where they have supplies of food and equipment to help them survive from the Dead and this is shown through a

Film made in 1978 and a remake adaptation of the film in 2004.

Financial determinants

The original Dawn of the Dead was directed by a man named George Romero who had brought the zombie genre to live as this had inspired ideas to make zombie Films which are now well known. George Romero became inspired to make another zombie film after the success of his previous one and decided to set his new zombie Film in a mall as his friend who owned the mall showed him parts of the mall that he or his workers could access and told Romero in a joke that someone could survive here if there is an emergency. Before George Romero could plan the production of his new film, he needed the money to fund it. Finding money was hard for George Romero as he couldn’t secure any money until he looked for help outside the US and he managed to secure his funding with a man called Dario Argento who is an Italian horror director and a fan of George Romero’s film Night of the living dead. George Romero and Dario Argento managed to secure money up to $1.5million and with this amount it allowed Romero to make his Film. The film was produced by a small film industry which is called United film distribution

The remake of Dawn of the dead was directed by Zack Snyder who has mainy directed action and science fiction films. Zack Snyder had an easier time securing money than Romero did trying to find his as the Film industries have changed and Zack Snyder managed to secure a budget of $26 million to fund and produce the remake. There was more than one productions companies that produced this, there was actually four companies who worked together to produce the remake and they were Strike entertainment, New Amsterdam Entertainment, Metropolitan Film export and Toho-Towa.

Technologies of production

Today special effects back in the 70’s would not be as imressieve as it is now in modern times but back in that time special effects was developing and people

had never seen the ground-breaking special effects that was used in Dawn of the Dead(1978) to people who had not seen special effects develop as there is a scene in the film where a head explodes and this all filled with food scraps and shot by a real gun during the scene to make the head explode. Another special effect would be the blood and guts that the zombies would tear apart and eat flesh and this is what made the film scary and successful during that time. The special effects and make-up of the zombies that can be seen in the film was all done by Tom Savini who is a famous special effects and make-up artist who had been working previously with George Romero.

In the 2004 remake Dawn of the dead had better and more advanced technology to do their scenes with special effects and computer generated images to make the zombies more freaky with chunks of their skin off and more off their bones showing and their eyes missing as this can be done and with computer generated image to makes scenes with the action scenes or when the zombies attack the survivors.

Distribution and Exhibition

The original Dawn of the dead had a lot of recuts and re edits done to the film but this would be due to Dario Argento’s rights to do this to the film and for the international foreign release and that is why there is an alternate version to the movie that audience have watched in Italy than the US version. Dawn of the Dead (1978) had a premier at the Cannes festival during its release. The original Dawn of the Dead had received the certificate X due to the violence within the Film. The rating that had been given to the film displeased Romero so he decided to have it unrated.

Genre

The original Dawn of the dead had shocked audiences as this film was one of the early zombie genre and people did not know what to expect when they saw the zombies and how people survive from the zombies. Out of all the zombie films that have been released over the years Dawn of the dead (1978) was the most successful zombie films of all time.

With the remake of Dawn of the dead it would not come as much as a surprise to people with the zombie genre as now you know what to expect as there have been so many released that it becomes cliché as times with the world being overrun by zombies and people have to survive but it can be shown in a better way with the use of technology and the latest equipment.