Cleveland Movie Blog:
As just a straight forward zombie action film, THE DEAD might still have satisfied if the leads were even slightly engaging. As written, though, the characters are pretty bland, and the actors portraying them give competent but bland performances. Aside from that, the film is technically solid, and the brothers Ford do manage to deliver a few good scenes of zombie mayhem and a few visually arresting shots. It's not enough to lift the film more than a hair above mediocre, but I do at least appreciate the effort and filmmaking talent that went into this.
LRA writes: Directed by brothers Howard J. Ford and Jonathon Ford, The Dead is a true return to that classic zombie formula that George Romero established over almost 45 years ago. While most zombie enthusiasts have spat upon the recent trend started almost a decade ago where zombies suddenly developed the ability to run after their prey, others like myself chose to accept that there were other ways to handle the undead. While I still believe there is a happy medium that has never been fully explored (seriously, if you want to get technical about the mobility of a zombie then upon the first 48 hours they should be limber and able to move about rather easily but once that rigamortis sets in they will be shambling until they get that bullet in the head), the Ford Brothers have decided to go back to what made zombies scary in the first place, creeping evil has returned.
Arcee "A few movies here and there have managed to keep the genre invigorated, but as a whole you could really skip every other 10 zombie films and it wouldn’t be that big a loss. But I urge you not to do that with The Dead. This zombie road thriller set in the African continent isn’t going to wow you with the gore say 28 Days Later did; but it will surprise you in ways that zombie films have forgotten to as of late – dread."
STYD:
An anticipated zombie film on the genre map, The Dead, is going to make its premiere at Film4's Frightfest in London this month. Here's new trailer to celebrate the occasion along with a message from director Howard Ford.
