Customer Reviews

Diary of the Dead [Blu-ray]

5 star:		(44)
4 star:		(49)
3 star:		(34)
2 star:		(24)
1 star:		(44)

 

 

I thought the film was okay but I know to myself it will never be my favorite out of the bunch. Though it was a documentary I didn't quite catch it as one or for the majority of the film. In here we have a film crew that made up of different characters: The director Jason (Joshua Close) who acts though he believes that if it didn't happen on camera, then it never happened at all. There's his girlfriend Debra (Michelle Morgan) who gets increasingly annoyed with his filming everybody, Tony (Shawn Roberts) who looks like he is prepared to beat Jason to death, and there's even the drunken film professor Maxwell (Scott Wentworth) who looks upon everything with a bemused attachment. What George Romero succeeds in doing as a writer is give us characters who aren't simple types and break those clichés to become increasingly unpredictable in their actions.

Which is one of Romero's strong attributes is that he gives us strong characters with females and minorities. He started doing this a long time ago with "Night Of The Living Dead," and it continues on with this one. The female character that comes across as the strongest here is Debra, played by Michelle Morgan. She is driven to get back to her family who are back at home, and she is not about to get sucked into watching things through a camera lens. Michelle gives the strongest performance in the movie, and she also narrates the movie within the movie, so you have a pretty good idea of what happens to her character. The group does run into a squad of African Americans who have taken over a small town and all its supplies, and who refuse to leave the town. This is because for once, they have power over something that they have never had before, and you could see it as a sort of revenge against the white man for all they have put their people through.

The movie does have its share of good scares, and has that same morbid humor that has been present in all of Romero's "Dead" movies. This does make this film relevant in a way even after four decades after the very first one. The last scene in the movie questions the audience directly as to if we as a race are really worth saving or not. That scene will stay with you long after the movie has ended because the characters have only started to learn how to exist in a post-zombie world (shades of 9/11 do abound here and there).

The suspense was there along with the blood and gore, it was giving to us in a fair dose though not quite on the same level as "Dawn" or "Day." Still, there are some good kills throughout, and the characters make good use of a scythe and a bow and arrow. Romero, after all these years, doesn't skimp on the good stuff. However, it still takes these characters way too long to figure out that the best way to defeat a zombie is to shoot it in the head. Aside from that I was slightly disappointed with this film or documentary. I'm thinking there may be room for another one Romero zombie yet, and there is hope to be had in that even if the world is still falling apart. I wouldn't mind seeing him do one more, but I hope it comes out before the apocalypse hits us.

Good evening. This is Tom with Channel 4 news. The stock market crashed as oil prices hit record highs. The unemployment rate ballooned nearly 10% the past month while crime keeps escalating at an alarming rate. Home equity plummetted, health care plans are becoming invalid, taxes rose, debt skyrocketed, and the soldier's death toll suffers its most jagged increase since the opening weeks of the war. But to heck with all that irrelevant junk, did you watch American Idol last night? Hahaha, that's some funny stuff!

My biggest problem with the latest Dead installment is the seesaw effect between the serious and the comical. Throw in so much cheese and corn, and it's hard to digest all of the social and political commentary. George makes some great points, some important profound statements, and then shows something totally absurd to spoil the moment. I didn't particularly care for that.
I've got some more issues with this one. The acting is pretty bad, but that didn't really bother me. Neither did the CGI. I hated the tone, or the mood of this entire story. George never really establishes a dark, gloomy, foreboding atmosphere. In my opinion, an adequate feel of desperation never settles in, I'm sorry to say.
I did love the idea of the homemade zombie documentary. Romero tries to bring a fresh element to the horror genre, and for that he should be commended. But the camera work was not too convincing. It rarely has a real feel. And I was shocked at how underdeveloped the characters are. Maybe this story is about people as a whole, but some closer connection with some individuals would have been nice.

Diary of the Dead starts strong, but quickly fizzles out in many aspects. There are some nice gore scenes, although it seemed to be lacking in that department a bit. It has some undeniably great pieces from the master, but are bogged down by chunks of disaster. I will say that I'm impressed with Romero's efforts at something original in the zombie saga. Hopefully his latest effort will grow on me.

Being a George Romero fan, of course I was very excited to see "Diary of the Dead". I didn't particularly care for his previous film; "Land of the Dead"(Romero's big budget outing) but hey, even great directors have their bad moments. With a very small budget, Romero's latest film seem to have captured the documentary style "gimmick" that have plagued other films. I never really cared for this style, I've always thought it was a one-hit wonder with "Blair Witch Project". Armed with a measly budget, can an acclaimed director pull off the dead end gimmick of a first person view? It almost feels blasphemous to give a critical review to a George Romero film, but amazon friends; Dave K and M have done it, Jenny, Main Man, M.B Cole and Chris Blackshere are on the middle ground while T-man loved this film. I'll give it a go. The issues with "Diary..." isn't all cosmetic, it was discipline.

The film is supposedly a documentary that is shot by a film student named Jason (Joshua Close) and narrated by his girlfriend Debra (Michelle Morgan). The film's main premise is that while they are in the woods with an alcoholic film professor (Scott Wentworth), the news of the dead coming back to life and feeding on the living breaks out. They pack up, gets in the RV and try to head home. In their journey, they encounter zombies, a militant group, zombies, a deaf amish, zombies, ex-national guardsmen, zombies, meet up with a friend, zombies...sounds repetitive doesn't it?

As with Romero's other films, "Diary of the Dead" contains a social commentary. No, it is not subtle at all; this message seemed to have taken the audience by its neck and kept on shaking until we passed out from boredom. It deals with the fact that because of the internet, more folks from all walks of life are reporting on current news and events, the more videos, the more the truth gets blurry until we don't know just what the truth is anymore. As usual, Romero uses the `undead' to make such a statement and fans are undoubtedly split on its preachy tone. The drunken film professor never runs out of alcohol and never runs out of insights about the past war and the philosophical aspects of mankind's inhumane actions seem to be a little out of place when he shoots a zombie with an arrow. There are also some attempts at satire with an deaf Amish but it seemed so cheap and incongruous. The SFX sometimes looked realistic, then at times looked very fake. It wasn't consistent in its delivery of the `undead'.

Romero also makes a bit of subtle coaching (he is the proclaimed zombie guru) to aspiring filmmakers when the characters discuss the workings of a horror flick; why is it women always loses their shoe, they trip over something, gets their clothes ripped to show a bit of skin? Then as a touch of irony a girl does trip, loses a shoe, gets her outfit ripped to show some breasts when she was being chased by a zombie. Romero also criticizes the more modern zombie flicks when he expresses that the `undead's' bones and joints are so brittle from decomposition that if they move fast, their `undead' bodies would break apart; therefore "moving slowly" or "shambling" is a necessity for all `undead' stars. (imagine that)

The problems in "Diary.." is that suspense is none-existent as the DV camera gimmick kills all attempts at such. The film also suffers quite a bit from the feeling that we've all seen it before, and we've seen it done better. The film also gets repetitive and their sense of purpose doesn't really provide any sense of credibility, which is further emphasized that the characters are so wooden and one-dimensional and the acting looks like they're reading the script out of the cue card. There is also a very annoying scene where Jason just kept on shooting his camera while a colleague was being chased by a zombie that displays his obsession with the documentary itself. This feeling of annoyance gives the character a very unlikable impression, much like the characters in "Cloverfield". It was quite annoying and nauseating to watch someone be so insensitive and at the same time dull. Perhaps this was an attempt (another commentary) to point out the indifference of everyday folks to the plight of their fellow men. Homelessness, poverty, etc.

My point to all this is while I agree that nobody mixes in social commentary with zombies as a vehicle better than George Romero; halfway through the film it was just too much and turned out so boring. This is a horror film and if and when I want to watch social preaching, I'll watch TV. The film is so darned predictable that as I expected, characters will make bad decisions, drive somewhere, they'd encounter zombies, narrowly escape, split into groups, then get trapped somehow and encounter zombies again. While I did expect the film to be full of cliché, I just wished Romero could have given it more thought in concentrating on giving thrills and chills (or even more gore) to cover it all up than stooping to a "commentary" about current society. Instead, the film is an overload of annoying scenes and an overkill of the same ol'stuff to cover up its very hollow execution. Body counts are aplenty but none of them were inventive, making the film very forgettable. It is not subtle at all with its message that in the end it just left a very bitter taste in my mouth. I really wanted to like this film and I doubt it will grow on me.

Die-hard fans will still praise and applaud this film just because it was made by George Romero; isn't it ironic that this film comments on the truth becoming jumbled when too many eyes are involved? Maybe it was the expectations and the hype that killed the film`s enjoyment?
RENTAL [2 ½ Stars]

Romero has been watching too many zombie movies. Yes, I know, that sounds a little weird, the man who practically invented the zombie movie, and who's masterpiece Night of the Living Dead has served as the inspiration for every undead film since is watching too many zombie films? Nonsense you say, crazy says another, what on earth makes me think that? Just look at the Romero of old, from the days of Dawn of the Dead and Day of the Dead and you'll notice that he doesn't rely on cheap tricks and logical inconsistencies to scare you. He's actually pretty straight forward when it comes to his scares. Here is a list of inconsistencies common to zombie films that Romero has seemed to pick up on.

1. Zombies don't hide and wait for people to stumble upon them to attack, they just attack. In two cases (maybe more but I can only remember two) the people and zombies were in the same building for about ten minutes before the zombies decided to come out of the closet and eat. This never happened in Romero's older movies (okay maybe it happened once in Dawn of the Dead), the zombies acted like zombies there, but in modern zombie films the zombies often times will seem to stalk their prey. Zombies don't hide from people and mount a surprise attack, they just attack.

2. Gory=scary. It doesn't. Gore is always good to have in a zombie movie, but when the gore replaces the scares then we have a problem. Romero's dead films have always been gory, from the comical attempt of Dawn of the Dead with the blue man group trying to break into a mall to Day of the Deads' rubber chicken mixed with pig guts. But both those movies also had a sense of dread going along with them. The unbeatable hordes of zombies, growing steadily every day, slowly breaking down your defenses, moaning for your flesh. Very creepy. Not here though. There is no mounting sense of dread. It's just gore, gore, and more gore.

A team of film students from the University of Pittsburgh are shooting a low budget horror film when news reports of the dead coming to life start coming over the radio. The group splits up but most end up going on a road trip across Pennsylvania to escape the growing number of undead who are roaming the countryside. Jason, the supposed leader of the group, takes it upon himself to film the disaster as it unfolds and put his video on YouTube so that hopefully people will see it and learn how to survive. The film should have been called "Road Trip of the Dead" because that's what it ends up being anyway. First they go here, run into zombies, kill a few and lose a member, only to hit the road again and repeat the process somewhere else, all while Jason films everything. Go here, kill zombies someone dies, go there kill some zombies someone dies. On and one and on and on.

The two biggest problems I found with the film though were the horrible acting, and the lack of believability with the documentary footage. There are no good actors in this film, with the exception of the professor who's drinking and preference to bows and arrows over guns was quite amusing. The narration is annoying and unnecessary, and the rest of the acting is either too much or too little, never the right amount. I found the character Jason to be especially annoying with his refusal to put down that stupid camera under any circumstances. Girlfriends little brother just tried to kill her? Don't help, film it. Zombie horde closing in? Don't help fix the van, film it. At one point one of the girls in the group is being chased by a zombie and he just follows them filming it, and lending no kind of help whatsoever. What a guy. If there are people like this I hope their first to be zombiefied. The film is shot on two hand held cameras documentary style much like Blair Witch Project and Cloverfield, but unlike those two films I never believed this was actually a documentary. It's different from those two films because not just the tape, it's edited and narrated, but even the parts which are just the guy filming don't have that documentary feel to it. It felt staged, scripted, not like a documentary should be. It never seemed like this was actual footage. That's what sets this film apart from other documentary style films.

The film had some pretty good ideas going for it, such as the road trip across undead America (all of Romero's previous films had the heroes held up in a fortress of some kind cut off from the outside world) and the news footage which really helped in showing just how the zombie plague was spreading. Got to say I loved the Amish guy who couldn't speak and who everyone thought was a zombie because he could only moan, even if he did just become cannon fodder. This film could have been really good, but alas it seemed like something a college student would make, not a seasoned veteran who's made lots of great films in the past. It was also pretty neat how Romero weaved in elements from Night of the Living Dead (he puts in part of the radio report from that film) and Dawn of the Dead (I didn't' see the guy with the camera filming that part in the apartment complex). The ending though was pretty lame.

I love Romero's films people, heck I even liked Land of the Dead, NO ONE liked Land of the Dead, except me, but even I couldn't give this movie anything more then two stars. I'm a pretty tolerant guy, but this isn't a good film, its preachy, not scary, and has some pretty major flaws.

The closing question this film asks is, are we really worth saving? Well I sure hope so, because if we aren't then nothing is.

Replay value; Low.

George A. Romero's legacy as a master horror filmmaker is secure, that much I'll say at the beginning. With films like "Night of the Living Dead", "Dawn of the Dead", "Day of the Dead", and the first two "Creepshow" films under his belt, George Romero has brought a lot to the genre over the years. Unfortunately it seems as if he's beginning to lose steam. "Land of the Dead" was a mediocre payoff for an ambitious effort, but "Diary of the Dead" is even less impressive.

Coming conspicuously hot on the heels of the hand cam style kaiju movie "Cloverfield", "Diary of the Dead" is a hand cam style zombie movie. While this is an interesting concept, the execution is so weak that the film seems little better than the recent Sci-Fi Channel Original "Return of the Living Dead" sequels. For one, the film begins with a voice over by one of the characters, who states woodenly that she put this film together from video she and her friends shot during the early days of a zombie outbreak. She then notes that she "added music to the film to try and scare you". Right. From that point on, the film follows a handful of film students who are trying to make a horror movie when the outbreak starts. They all decide to take off in an RV and regroup, one by one, with their families. One of them, an aspiring young director named Jason, refuses to stop filming, stating repeatedly that has to record everything so people will know the truth.

The idea of media truth is the central theme of this film. It begins by implying that all big media is so slanted as to be of absolutely no value and that perhaps user-produced media (like blogs and Youtube) is a better avenue for truth. Midway through the film, the message shifts to something along the lines of "the more voices there are, the more spin there is because everyone wants to tell the story their way". Now these issues are certainly worth discussing, but Romero has completely abandoned every last iota of subtlety in addressing them. Once upon a time Romero's films contained social commentary that had to be read into a little to really be appreciated. "Land of the Dead" was more obvious about it than the previous installments, but "Diary of the Dead" just beats you over the head with it as if viewers will be too stupid to get such an obvious premise.

This is greatly exacerbated by the ongoing voice over, always delivered in a wooden monotone, that constantly interrupts the flow of the film and even goes so far as to blow some scares for viewer by introducing them before they happen. What in the world was Romero thinking? The characters are all stiff and do little to draw our sympathies, and Jason, the lead, is easily the worst among them. It is completely unbelievable that anyone, even some sort of uber-serious documentary film student, would go so far as to, say, film a zombie attack rather than helping his own friends to fight them off or stay with his charging camera rather than help his companions look for help for a gravely injured friend. When a zombie movie is cobbled together poorly enough that believability issues enter the viewer's mind at all it means that something is very wrong.

What's even weirder is that none of the characters seem all that frightened of the fact that there's zombies around. They all seem capable of shooting perfectly straight, making wisecracks, and efficiently wielding any weapon from defibrillator paddles to dynamite to easily dispatch their foes. The viewer never feels any real sense of danger at all, even, bizarrely, when people are dying. The movie barely makes an effort to build tension, and almost any time some modicum of suspense is allowed to build up it is instantly blown by an intrusive and utterly unnecessary voice over.

"Diary of the Dead" is an almost staggeringly tedious movie. Before its release I'd waited with baited breath for this movie to come out, but in all honestly I spent the final half of the movie just waiting for it to end. It pains me to say this about a George Romero zombie movie, but I'm not lying when I say that I haven't seen a zombie flick this hard to enjoy since the legendary French stinker Zombie Lake.

As a fan of Romero's past zombie films, I was pretty let down by "Diary of the Dead". It has three pretty significant flaws in my humble opinion.

1. No shock: Nothing new or even effective here in terms of scares, effects, or mood. In fact, it falls far short of ever conveying a sense of menace or threat to the cast. Once you've seen one take of fake intestines falling out of a corpse, really, you've seen them all, and we've seen all this before.

2. Fails to get the "first person" perspective: Like them or not, films like "Blair Witch Project" and "Cloverfield" succeeded, in my opinion, in creating a look that made you believe they were being filmed hand-held... that you were getting a live, "as it happened" view. "Diary of the Dead" drops the ball on this in many places. Dialogue is stilted and unnatural. The performances fail to convey the sense that they are living the events, and are pretty flat in general. The shots look too staged and lack any sort of visceral feel. While the narration indicates that the footage has been edited and had music added, the result is a poorly constructed mash of two styles. The narration, music, and edited shots ruin the first person feel, while the attempts at first person come off stiff and unnatural. All in all, really ineffective.

3. Just plain dull: First person pictures have to engender some suspension of disbelief to overcome the obvious thought "why don't you drop the @#$%!! camera and run?" The set up feels really contrived in this film... more so than others. The attempts at social commentary... e.g. government is trying to cover up what's really going on, hunters shooting zombies for fun... are ham-fisted, blunt, and feel tacked-on rather than part of an integrated theme. When the narrator actually asks "Are we really worth saving?" at the end, it was too silly for words. This was the kind of theme Romero put forth excellently in the original "Dawn of the Dead" without having a character blatantly cry out "why do we destroy each other??"

The result is a pretty bland film, with uninteresting performances and boring gore effects. In the special features, Romero makes reference to going back to the original "Night of the Living Dead" with this film. Perhaps he should have done so more literally, 'cause that film still holds up as a masterpiece of terror.

Diary of the Dead finally released in my hometown. Overall, it was a decent flick but I couldn't help but feel somemthing was lacking. Romero decided to film the movie with a Blair Witch/documentary type of feel and this (I felt) kind of shorted the viewer. Instead of being able to lose yourself in the story, your constantly reminded you are in fact watching a movie.

Downsides-
The movie is constantly interrupted by narrative voice-overs.
Because the group decides to bypass major populated areas, you never get to really see whats going on in the real world except for tiny news clips which you have to watch as the "camera" films the group watching on a tiny monitor.
As soon as the group gets a chance to access weapons not one more gunshot is fired throughout the film (LAME).
The "camera guy's" friends would not shut-up about him filming. Get over it already or break his camera.

Upsides-
Samuel the Amish guy totally rocked! (Diary is worth seeing just for this charecter alone).
Zombie Goldfish
A few (and sad to say I do mean few) nice zombie deaths.

I'd have to say Dawn of the Dead is still remains my favorite and in order to be completely fair, as of now, I would have to rank "Diary" as my least favorite. I really wanted to be blown away but I have to admit I wasn't.

Diary of the Dead is still worth seeing especially if your a zombie or Romero fan. Just don't have your hopes up to see anything new and innovative to be added to this genre. Keep your eye out for a George Romero cameo! I give it 3.5 stars (*sigh*).

I just want to say that I love Romero and the original three movies (Night, Dawn, and Day) are still some of my favorite horror movies. When I first caught wind that "Diary of the Dead" was beeing made in a hand-held camcorder style, I got excited! The possibilities were endless. Images of potential storylines ran through my head and I couldn't wait to see the film. Needlees to say, the film hardly played in any theaters (was only available for one day near me, but I already had a prior engagement) so I was forced to wait for the dvd. On Tuesday, my time came.

It took me two attempts to finish this movie. I never quite felt sucked into the storyline or found the characters to be believable. As another reviewer had previously stated, they did not feel like "real" people. They were clearly actors, not very good ones, trying to act like they weren't acting.

Understanding full well that Romero always has a message in his movies, I was shocked at how blatant he made it in this film. I often felt awkward when a character would go off on some heavy-handed tangent about filming an incident instead of taking action, and then they'd stare into the screen as though I should ponder what they've just said. This stare would make me feel awkward for a few seconds, not because the message hit home, but because these performances are going to haunt their careers forever. I could easily see some of these actors/actresses in some of those "The More You Know" commercials.

The gore also was not present in this movie in the manner that you'd expect. Most of the classic effects were replaced by CGI, and not very good CGI at that. I think the same person that made the "spiderman" zombies for the Day of Dead remake might have done the special effects for this film.

Overall, the idea had potential but the execution was horrible. I feel as if something a little more "Cloverfield" in style would have been better. What if these students had been in class as the news reports rolled in? What if they'd had contact with their families and were told to stay put? Shots of bored college students in their dorms would be interrupted my screams across the campus. The confusion caused by the sudden appearance of zombies on campus would send everyone into a panic and trying to scramble away. Maybe the students could try and escape? Maybe they would barricade themselves in and keep a video diary? Maybe they'd only leave in order to collect food and supplies? I don't know. Just about anything could have been better than this film. This felt too amateurish to be Romero.

When a friend comes up to you and tells you he has something for you but the only way you're going to get it before he watches it, is for you to rub his feet and suck on his big toe, you just know he has something good. I laughed and asked him "Come on man... just tell me what it is." He tells me, "I got a copy of Diary of the Dead...sup."

After gargling some mouthwash and wiping my mouth, I stuck Diary of the Dead into my laptop with Zombie glee pouring out my brraaaainnnss. The film begins with one of the best opening scenes to a zombie movie in my opinion. A new cast is filming a gruesome murder scene, to only witness the dead rise and begin to attack. When the lady zombie gets up, you can see her eyes fixated on the camera man from the start, but he's looking at another zombie mainly and sometimes you can see the female getting closer and then BAM in your face. And she looks wicked thanks to the zombie makeup that does not go over the top.

We then come across some college students (our main attraction) who are filming what I'm pretty sure is a low budget Mummy movie. During a break to fix makeup, they learn about how the dead are rising. Whether it's real or not, everyone decides to go home. Two head to the `Mummy's' house (more like mansion), the rest decide to go get the director's g/f and then everyone at once head to their parents houses which are, thankfully, on the way to someone else's parents house. While on the road, they are basically safe, but it's during the stops that the troubles begin.

The story was great and the zombies were fantastic. I can see what Romero was doing here and I totally enjoyed it, but there were things that just really bothered me about the movie and I'll got into a little detail for them

1. The acting was atrocious. The movie is supposed to be filmed like a documentary, but the acting seemed like acting. None of it had a real feel to me. I saw actors, trying to act like, they weren't acting. And bad acting doesn't bother me, it's just the fact that it kept taking me out of what I was supposed to be feeling, and that was that I was watching a documentary.

2. The camera. The documentary feel doesn't bother me. I liked how Cloverfied was filmed because I KNEW that it was supposed to FEEL like a documentary. And that's what it felt like. This though felt more staged. To me Diary felt more like a videogame the way it was filmed. Like I was watching a rail camera.. It felt like HUD was actually behind the camera in Cloverfield. Jason Creed, well, he felt more like a camera machine and not a human. Yeah I'm sure this helped a lot with the shaky camera problem that a lot of people hated about Clovefield and made them run out to get Dramamine pills for, but it took away from the REALNESS that I believe Romero wanted for the movie. What I meant about the rail camera above was that it felt like certain scenes were choreographed to give us a scare or put action into the scene. Sure I know ALL scenes in ALL movies are choreographed, but they don't FEEL like it. Hopefully you get what I'm saying, I might be having trouble trying to explain it.

3. CG was used. I couldn't believe this. On little things such as gunshots to the head cg was used. Blood splatter from the back of the head was CG. That really pissed me off cause I hate when CG is used for things that special effects artists can CLEARLY make look better with actual real life blood packets and whatever other cool gadgets they got. There was one scene where the CG was used correctly and looked really good and it involved acid. Sure we've seen acid scenes before with make-up effects or whatever, but this looked really good. But it doesn't make up for the other countless CG effects that could've been easily done the good old fashioned way.

4. The editing on some scenes made me scratch my head in befuddlement. I get the fact that Romero is giving us a lesson on how we are using camera, phone cameras, whatever else is out there gadget wise, to film everything around us now. But I don't need that to ruin a good scene for me. In one part, the Winnebago the crew is driving, runs over a group of zombies. Well right when we are getting ready to see a nice scene, the camera switches over to one of the camera phones somebody was using. So we don't get the good sound or video we were witnessing. It goes to a very crappy looking and sounding shot of these zombies getting run over. I was pissed at that.

In the end, I get the message. The media. The constant updating of OUR lives. The youtubes and MySpaces. The car wreck syndrome. The `not really being there feel' when you are behind the camera. I get it. But when I'm watching a zombie movie, I'm watching it for the zombies first and..well..second. The message can go in there somewhere also, but I REALLY could care less. I want my carnage. I want my blood. I want my gore. I want my feel of hopelessness. I got what I wanted, but I honestly think Romero could've done better. Will I watch this again? Hell yes. It's better than a LOT of the zombie movies out now. I will own it also and spend the extra dough on the blu-ray version as well. I think EVERYONE should at least rent it and give it a try. Just don't going in it's going to be blockbuster quality because it's just not... in my opinion.

To my zombie and gore friends, please don't hate me for giving this 3 stars... lol. I just have to rate it how I feel.



P.S. The scene looking out of the barn via the camera was very cool looking.

I've always loved George A. Romero's zombie movies, dating back to when I first saw Night of the Living Dead (90's version) when I was just a kid.
I remember that I loved the 2004 remake of Dawn of the Dead, then I saw the original version and loved it even more!
Night of the Living Dead & Dawn of the Dead set a standard for zombie movies that cannot be surpassed. Perhaps that's why Diary of the Dead comes up a bit short...
Diary of the Dead was a good zombie movie, and worthy of mention as one of George A. Romero's movies. However, that's just it... Diary of the Dead is good, just "good" not Great. The movie keeps you feeling tense throughout, (just as Romero's earlier movies did) yet this one has some issues.
First of all, the acting isn't so great... While some of the characters are portrayed quite well by their actors, some of them are so bad that you feel like you're watching A Sci-Fi Channel Original Movie, and that's where Diary of the Dead suffers most.
Next, while the new through-the-lens Documentary-like style of the movie is a fresh approach to the Dead series, and it's realistic how the main character constantly has to recharge the battery in his camera, (unlike the everlasting battery from Cloverfield) it just feels too different from the other Dead movies.
Furthermore, Diary of the Dead really has no place in the Dead series. It's not a sequel, nor is it a prequel to any of Romero's earlier movies. One could make the arguement that it's set before the events in Night of the Living Dead, but unless they remake it again, that wouldn't make any sense. This plot of Diary of the Dead is set in modern times, there are cell phones, camcorders, and internet access in the world of Diary of the Dead. The last Night of the Living Dead movie was made in the 90's, yet it really didn't have anything in it to suggest that the happening in the movie took place anytime after the 1960's, so to claim that Diary of the Dead took place before Night of the Living Dead wouldn't fit with the timeline.
And lastly, the special effects aren't as good as the 90's remake of Night of the Living Dead, or the original version of Dawn of the Dead, why? Because Tom Savini, the guy who did the special effects for both the 90's remake of Night of the Living Dead & the original Dawn of the Dead was not part of the special effects crew for Diary of the Dead. One of the reason's why 90's Night & the original Dawn of the Dead had such realistic special effects is because Tom Savini was a war photographer in the Vietnam war, but for some reason he wasn't part of the Special Effects crew of this movie.

On a side note, I live in PA, and my college student friends don't drop the F-bomb nearly as casually as the characters in this movie do.
The stereotype that all us young whipper-snappers are so found of using the F word is blown way out of proportion in movies today, and Diary of the Day has fallen prey to it.

The Verdict: Good zombie movie by George A. Romero, but that's about it... Paid 17.99 for a movie that I may never watch again.
Rent it before you buy it.