Night Of The Living Dead DVD Retrospective

[JohnIan101]

PART III: ANTIPATHY - A2

Continuing...

When the second wave of ghouls attack the house. When Ben, Tom and Judy leave to get gas and subsequent explosion. When Ben gets back to the house. When all hell breaks loose, Ben shoots Harry; ghouls almost get Helen. When the zombies finally get in. And lastly when the posse is close to farm house.



Amazon reviewer, Bill Robinson noted a flub. At the car crash, one of the kids who got killed. Her shoes are contemporary, what appears to be Sketchers. A product that didn't exist in the late 1960s.

Another by commenter, XQuester; how come the passeners of that car crash are 'perfectly seated' even though none wearing seatbelts? The car impacted into a tree.

They would've shoot through the windshield, like those clowns blasted out of cannons.

A good example; the opening credits of "Zombieland" (2009), the woman who crashed (that's reality based, not pretty).



I think it's on purpose that Rev. Hicks looks like Anton LaVey; founder of the Church Of Satan. At least I hope so.

That featurette isn't - false advertising, it's just home video clips edited together. The only thing interesting is an on set visit by none other than Karl Hardman, smoking a cigar.

For an abomination, the picture quality is good. Even though this is full screen, the image does not touch the sides, fuzzy black boarders. The audio was good to okay, I don't have a sound system so I can't give a better review here. But what I caught immediately was the simulated stereo. I remember hearing this on episodes of "MASH" when it aired on channel 11 here, Fox, Los Angeles.

After viewing it (bought a copy), Harry Knowles, webmaster of Ain't It Cool News made the following edict on September 19th, 1999:

I will ban anyone that likes this piece of **** from my talkback. WHY? Simply because If you like this piece of **** abortion of a product, I could really give a **** if you ever read my site. No nice words will be spoken about John Russo or that Reverend Big Teeth in any place that I have created. Those intellectually deprived, artistically bankrupt hacks should be shunned from society. ANY magazine that has promoted this festering pussbucket of a product should be BURNED! It is terrible in the ways that ... I don’t know what way. Cause I’ve never experienced anything that sucked this hard.

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My thoughts?

It's superflatulistichalitosis or excrementainment.

BUT I am okay with the overall notion. It would make a cool expanded motion picture, like the paperback novelization by Christopher Andrews (Rising Star Visionary Press, 2009.

What happened is they had a high concept; carried out on a limited budget and a talent pool who couldn't execute it proper. Add to the mix bad actors, hamming it up and the gumption to believe they improved on the original. A bad combination.

Plus they took out what gave the film its flavor - what made it feel true and not hokey. We all know people like these characters, it's not so removed from real life. Well, minus the dead rising to feast on the living of course.

As written in The Seattle Times on August 20th, 1999 (Mark Rahner, reporting); the production had a budget of $300,000. It needed at least twice that much. There is one dead body in the new footage, mentioned car crash. The corpse looks like a puppet; NO weight to it. And quite fake. Why did it look like Hardman?

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SOUNDTRACKS PART V

The "Limited Edition" came with a CD soundtrack. The tracks are a mixture of music and film dialog. It contains a bonus track.

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Tracks

1. "This Radio Station Will Remain On The Air"
2. The Dead Walk
3. "I Gotta Get Back To Beekman's"
4. Night Of The Living Dead
5. "That's The Lord's Way Of Punishing Sinners"
6. Resurrection
7. "Boy, You'll Be Damned To Hell"
8. They're Coming To Get You
9. Heads
10. Sanctuary
11. "They Know We're In Here Now"
12. The Congregation Gathers
13. "Is There A Key?"
14. The Beginning Of The End
15. "We Have To Go Out & Get Johnny"
16. Ashes To Ashes
17. "Your Brother Is Dead"
18. Music Box
19. "You Know A Place Back Down The Road Called Beekman's?"
20. Ben's Tale
21. "The Unburied Dead"
22. Tension
23. "In The Cold Room"
24. Window Into Hell
25. Isolation
26. "The Killers Are Eating The Flesh"
27. Feast
28. Isolation Reprise
29. "The Dead Are Rising"
30. The Secret Door
31. "I'm Boss Up Here"
32. The Siege Begins
33. "The Cellar's The Safest Place"
34. The Safest Place
35. "We'll See Who's Right"
36. Tragic Love
37. "Helen"
38. Alone
39. "I Oughta Drag You Out There & Feed You To Those Things"
40. Rhapsody In Crimson
41. "The Scream"
42. Mother's Milk
43. "The Posse"
44. Hell On Earth
45. "They're Dead"
46. Decay
47. "Shoot 'Em In The Head"
48. Dawn
49. "Somebody Had A Cookout Here"
50. The Hunt
51. "Hit Him In The Head"
52. The Killing Stroke
53. Innocent Blood
54. "He's A Dead One"
55. Tragedy
56. "The Dead Must Be Spiked"
57. Descent Into Madness/The Dead Walk: Movement Two
58. The Dead Walk: Movement Three
59. Dance Of The Dead
60. Night Of The Living Dead 1968 (bonus unlisted track)

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Bought the Limited Edition in 2004 - that was the first time I saw the 30th Anniversary. I read various reviews, which condemned it. So I knew going it that this was going to be a train wreck. Personal info, I surfaced online in the Spring of 1999, dial-up (still on it). I've always been collecting soundtracks, before CDs it was cassette tapes.

DVDs didn't enter my life until November of 2003. At this time in '99 I was actively pursuing laser discs. To my surprise, the company which produced the new score, Screem Jams Productions had a website which was selling the soundtrack by itself, no DVD attached.

I've been a fan of Ain't It Cool News since my early days of internet. But that website kept crashing my browser, Netscape. So my ability to read content/reviews was very limited; surfing the web on a 14K modem on a computer with a 75 MHz processor.

Dared to dream!



I found out that I could buy this soundtrack (by itself) by check or money order, got a postal money order and sent it off. A week or so later the above came to my home. This was released in 2001.

The CD has a different disc image than the one used in the "Limited Edition". It came in a printed cardboard sleeve (cover art by Alex Ross) with a flap to seal/re-seal. The back of the sleeve listed the track names - minus one. I remember emailing them since track 60 was a mystery and received a reply with name.

This soundtrack was mostly exclusive to that DVD set and had a far lesser release individually, less than 15,000.

Like what I heard - wanted more.

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Available in even limited numbers was the enhanced CD single, "Dance Of The Dead".

Sent over a postal M.O. and shortly received this too. The enhanced part is the music video (same on the DVD), presented as an MPG. This too came in a printed cardboard sleeve with flap (cover by Talon Nightshade). The difference here is my copy, under the flap is autographed by the composer.

I can barely find a couple mentions online; like it never existed, making this one of the rarest CDs in my collection. Even the website Soundtrack Collector doesn't have a listing.

Once again I emailed to learn the bonus' name. Both CDs were released in 1999. I have no catalog numbers (or UPC), they are absent. Both are now inside that Alpha case in near mint condition; sleeve and discs. Sorry, I don't remember what I paid for them.

Tracks

1. Dance Of The Dead ('They're Coming To Dance With You, Barbara' Mix)
2. Waltz Of The Dead (Featuring Russ "Johnny" Streiner)
3. Dance Of The Dead (Album Version)
4. Waltz Of The Raving Dead (Featuring Russ "Johnny" Streiner) (bonus unlisted track)

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So many people complain about the Licina score. As you can tell, I'm not among them. It works (mostly); needs to be more subtler.

I like atmosphere music, fan of the genre. Bands like Midnight Syndicate, Nox Arcana and Buzz-Works. The odds are if you have been to Knotts Scary Farm or Universal Studios' "Halloween Horror Nights" you have heard their music. The first two have created music for Halloween attractions, both have been doing it for nearly a decade. I suppose it's an acquired taste.

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Quick mentions.

In 2001 there was a sequel to this balderdash, "Children Of The Living Dead". I remember a comic by that name in 1998, but didn't know there was a real flick. The movie is different. Pure crap from the reviews I've read. They must've had some kind of compromising photos of Tom Savini for him to star in that direct to video flick.



In 2013 The Andrew Alden Ensemble released both a CD ($10.00) and digital download ($7.00); fan made soundtrack to the classic, meant to be played in sync with the film. Five tracks; five acts. Gave it a listen - not all impressed; heavy emphasis on violin and viola. They were going for a gothic sound.

Be here next Thursday for more NOTLD history.