No, I’m not talking about the original 1968 George Romero version. There’s really not much of a column there. I’m talking about the 2003 Universal remake of the 1968 George Romero version. The one that caused fans to have a coronary when they learned it would be scripted by James “SCOOBY-DOO” Gunn. Curious, I tucked the bad boy under my arm for some light reading on the plane out to LA.

This script is dated October of 2002 and is listed as “Revision 2.5”. As far as I know, no director or actors are attached to this script [Ed. Note: Ving Rhames is, as of two days ago], although I believe that process is in motion.

Before I start biting into this script, let me first say I’m by no means an aficionado on the zombie genre. I enjoy a good zombie flick now and again but I’m not fanatical about it. I didn’t flip out when I read the film was being remade, or at least no more so then when I read about ANY film being remade. The only zombie film I really remember much of, besides the original NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD, was RETURN OF THE LIVING DEAD II, because “get that damn screwdriver out of my head” became somewhat of a catchphrase back in 6th grade. In fact, I had to go back and watch DAWN again to remind myself after I read the script. So forgive me if I don’t speak as eloquently on the subject as some.

The script starts in a typical suburb with a young woman named Ana Cortez at home in a comfortable, complacent, yet somehow unsatisfying relationship with her husband, Luis.

“The house around him unkempt, with beaten furniture and Heineken cans doubling as ashtrays, the product of an overworked wife and a less-than-responsible husband. Despite this, the household’s warmth is evident…”

After dinner and some hot lovin’, they are awakened by a little girl just standing in their bedroom. She looks…odd, but she’s standing in the shadows and it’s hard to tell. Sick? Hurt? What’s the matter little girl? Well apparently she’s hungry and hungry for some Cortez flesh as she’s soon nibbling on Luis’s neck and “tears the flesh from his throat like a wolf.” He fights her off and Ana tends to his wound. She tells him to stay calm, she’ll call 911. Picking up the receiver, Ana realizes there is no dial tone. She turns back to her husband and he inexplicably starts attacking her. Confused, she stumbles back not sure what to do. Why is my husband trying to bite me in a non-sexual/Marv Albert kind of way? Why did a neighborhood girl bite his neck? What the fuck am I supposed to do now?

Eventually Ana escapes, running out to her car. As the script describes, “everything is chaos.” Houses on fire. Neighbors on their front lawn being attacked by the elderly couple next door. Our heroine watches in horror as the carnage, and the film, begins.

From there you should know, if you’re at all familiar with the original, where the story goes. Ana and a group of others are holed up in a mall as zombies close in around them.

I would like to tell people to calm down. That everything is alright with Romero’s beloved classic. But I’d be lying.

Gunn’s DAWN is not awful. It’s certainly a marked improvement from SCOOBY-DOO (although ………..). But while it’s not awful, it’s really not much of anything at all really.

------------------

“Ana spies a BUSINESSMAN ZOMBIE, in suit and tie, walking his dog, only his dog is just a dog’s head that he drags on a leash behind him. She PANS to a SHOPPING ZOMBIE, repeatedly slamming a cart into the side of the mall. And to the JOGGING ZOMBIE, jogging in small circles.

ANA
What are the all doing?

MICHAEL
They seem to get stuck in loop
patterns of activities that were familiar.”

The script is a zombie in and of itself. It ambles around, not sure what it is or what it used to be. There are some moments where you sense life, something that reminds you of something that once was beautiful and real. But it’s just going through the motions; repeating what’s familiar.

Gunn’s version is not particularly scary nor is it particularly funny (Despite a few moments, the film isn’t meant to be funny, but even those moments provided more eye-rolling than chuckling.). I realize it’s just a script and likely some of the scares and tension will come with seeing the grotesque zombies on screen jump out at you, but there should be some translation. There should be something there. I turned the page like I was reading a Best Buy circular - very matter-of-factly, never once flipping ahead with great anticipation for what was on the next page. I've read horror/thriller scripts where I could barely stop myself from turning the page before I was done reading I was so in suspense. Not quite the case here.

My main problem was the characters. I never felt particularly attached to any of them, save for a lonely gentlemen named Andy who’s stranded on the roof of a nearby gun store. He speaks no lines (although communicates via a dry erase board) and appears only through the binoculars of one of our main characters, yet I felt more connected to him than anyone else. When he finally met his demise, I felt the only twinge of sadness in the entire script (and plenty of people meet their demise).

Andy aside, I was practically rooting for the death of such irritating characters as Peacock, “a black gangbanger, holding two 9 mms,” and a group of thugs consisting of “muscular white thug” CJ, the “fat…covered in prison tattoos” E-Bomb (yes, E-Bomb…) and “runty” Terry. They serve no purpose other than to talk in ghetto slang, curse and complicate the plans of our team. Peacock, along with his pregnant girlfriend Luda, are there for a specific purpose, but even when that became evident, I wasn’t particularly moved one way or the other.

I also found it a bit strange that a woman, our heroine Ana, not long after losing her husband to a zombie attack (!!!!) would already start screwing some other guy, one she just met to boot. Just seems a bit unlikely. My mind would probably be somewhere else in that situation - possibly on the fact that the dead have risen, are walking the Earth feasting on human flesh and my wife is among their ranks - but hey, there’s got to be a romantic angle right?…

Later on in the script, the initial few characters are expanded upon when a handful more are added into the mix (although in a scenario completely unlike the biker raid in Romero’s).

There was an old Janeane Garofalo bit a while back that talked about the movie SPEED and how corny it was in that every stereotype was included on that bus - the crazy Hispanic guy, the uptight white guy, the old Chinese woman, the black bus driver, etc, - with the joke being there should’ve been an Eskimo or something on there to round it out. I feel like that here with DAWN with all the clichéd, stereotyped characters. There’s the white alpha-male, the feisty Hispanic woman, the black hoodlum, the tough white guy with the heart of gold, the funny fat guy, the priest, the older black cop (think Reginald Vel Johnson from DIE HARD), the ditzy teenage girl, the goth chick, the rich, self-absorbed white couple…

Poor character development aside, could this be a satisfying zombie film? Probably. There aren’t much to the usual zombie films other than zombies, victims, gore and a few cheap laughs and this version of DAWN has all those elements. With the right director it could all be done reasonably well. It certainly would be better than RESIDENT EVIL. But for it to carry on the name of DAWN, one of the finest and most respected horror films, is unfortunate, because it will always hark back to its predecessor.

The film is basically just characters getting themselves into shitty situations and finding a way to get out of those situations in “cool” (I use that word loosely) and cinematic ways. Wasn’t part of the beauty of the original was that there was more to it than just the living dead and gore? That people were looting a mall as the world was ending around them? What good is money when zombies are taking over and chaos reigns free? Only one brief image in the script gets it right - the bitchy rich woman trying on a diamond necklace.

I fully expected that by the script’s halfway point, it would become increasingly clear to the audience and the characters that they better get the hell out of the mall. The zombies can smell their blood, dammit and there’re so many of them, eventually they’re going to find a way inside that mall to eat the flesh of whoever’s inside.

This left me with a glimmer of hope. The mall escape. The Great Mall Escape. Just how would a bunch of humans, very likely the last human on the face of the Earth, get out of the mall, get past the zombies and continue to live on the outside world. Or would they even? The climax comes and eventually, as our group is whittled down to a select few, they break free - in truly unspectacular fashion. Oh sure, the script would have you believe it’s this big exciting moment, but it did nothing for me. Zero. I won’t go into details so as not to ruin the whole film but I just didn’t care at that point. Fight the zombies. Kill `em. Let them kill you. Play flag football together. Either way, I don’t really care. It should’ve been this desperate, last-ditch fight for survival and it tries but just falls short.

What really is most tragic is that a remake as pointless as this has to occur. That’s the biggest slap in the face to the original. We’re going to add nothing, save for a few updated mentions of Circuit City and The Gap, and redo this film in contemporary fashion, keeping the blood and guts and leaving behind all the social commentary on crass commercialism, the bitter irony being crass commercialism spawned this remake in the first place.

I know it seems like I've come down pretty hard on this script even though I told myself not to. It's not awful and if James Gunn could've submitted a similar film to Universal under a different name with slightly different pretenses, it could be one of the best zombie films to come along in a while should it attract quality talent. But it holds itself up to a classic and it winds up coming off like a cheap replica. Just imagine if someone had the gall to produce a shitty remake to CHARADE and cast Mark Wahlberg in Cary Grant's role. Oh wait...

I hope more revisions are on the way for DAWN OF THE DEAD. I hope Universal doesn't rush this into theaters to beat the zombie movie Disney is planning. Take your time. Let James rework this script (he's not the demon fans have made him out to be after SCOOBY-DOO). Find a director you trust. And for God's sake, whatever you do, don't take out "Talk Dirty to Me" by Poison. THAT was perfect.

E-MAIL THE AUTHOR | ARCHIVES