Today’s quick review: Day of the Dead. In the aftermath of a zombie apocalypse, Sarah (Lori Cardille) leads a mission to rekindle civilization by looking for survivors and researching a way to control the zombies. But as the weeks drag on with no results, Rhodes (Joe Pilato), the commanding officer of the military side of the mission, threatens to have Sarah and her colleagues executed if they do not come up with something useful.
Day of the Dead is a zombie horror movie from director George A. Romero. Acting as a loose sequel to Dawn of the Dead, Day of the Dead shows the end state of a zombie outbreak, where all of America is overrun and a handful of survivors try to make something of the ruins. The movie cranks up the gore and the horror of the series, exploring not only the gruesome nature of the zombies but the inhuman cruelty of the survivors as well.
Day of the Dead has a tense setup. The story takes place in a military bunker where tempers are running high. Although the bunker itself is secure, the slow drip of casualties has caused a rift between the military and civilian sides of the mission, with Rhodes taking control by force and Sarah trying everything short of mutiny to stop him. Meanwhile, Dr. Logan (Richard Liberty) performs ghoulish experiments to decipher the zombies.
What follows is a story that is dark, dramatic, and drowning in gore. The zombies are a constant threat, kept in check but never fully controlled. The infighting between the soldiers and the civilians escalates quickly, and the tenuous peace between them soon reaches the breaking point. The gory special effects tie the whole thing together, keeping the zombies menacing and putting an exclamation point on every death.
Day of the Dead is a strong pick for fans of the zombie genre. Although it is not as groundbreaking as Night of the Living Dead or Dawn of the Dead, it taps into a darker strain of storytelling, with a bleaker setting, more acrimonious characters, and impressive special effects. Try it out when you are in the mood for a zombie movie that does not shy away from its subject matter. Skip it if you are at all sensitive to gore.
For a sci-fi horror movie with a similarly tense story and even more unsettling special effects, try The Thing. For a science fiction movie about a lone band of humans making questionable choices to survive on an overrun Earth, try War for the Planet of the Apes. For a sci-fi horror movie with a similar main character, try Alien or Aliens.
[7.1 out of 10 on IMDB](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0088993/). I give it a 7.0 to 7.5 for a tense plot and effective horror.