The Edge of Town : "Dawn of the Dead"

I watch very little TV these days, but occasionally feel the need for a fix, and so it was last weekend. On Saturday, I caught the trailer for what appeared, at first sight, to be a programme about edge of town suburban (sub-urban !) housing development. As this is a subject which can really get me going, I felt an instant surge of adrenalin. Many places are threatened with such development just now, not least in the West Midlands, and Worcester in particular. However, the programme trailer turned out to be for a US horror film made in 2004, called "Dawn of the Dead".

Sure enough the action is set on "the edge of town", supposedly the US City of Milwaukee (?), and opens when the heroine, a nurse, is involved in the admission of patient with a "bite" that turns nasty : very nasty, indeed, as it happens. In fact, a bite like this and you're one of the "undead", or a human blood devouring zombie. Very soon there are very few survivors of this outbreak, and those there are take refuge in an edge of town shopping mall, which happens to be next to the local gun shop (more of a major ammunitions arsenal). This is just as well, for the only way for healthy sane folk to kill their zombie compatriots is to shoot them through the brains. Needless to say there is alot of this amongst the more general carnage.

The film, which I have to confess was actually rather gripping, is accompanied with a curious sound track which starts off with easy listening rock ballads, and descends into nihilistic grunge. By the end, the cinematography has also disappeared, to be replaced with home movie type footage which reminds you of "The Blair Witch Project", but even more fragmented. This is also rather effective. However, like many intoxicating things, the film leaves something of an aftertaste. Bit like a bad trip, I imagine, never having had a real one. In short, you want to make sure your doors are bolted, just in case the neighbours turn nasty during the night.