By Troy Brownfield

It's That Time Again!

Ladies and Gentlemen, a warm welcome to Halloween! Yes, my favorite holiday season is in full unbloom. To mark the occasion, 20th Century Fox is wisely releasing the highly enjoyable zombie epic 28 Days Later on DVD next week. The package comes with 3 endings, so there's plenty of virus-spreading mayhem to be had.

So, in honor of said film, I thought I'd revisit my favorite zombie flicks. I once posted a different version of this list that apparently forced some idiot to email me repeatedly, bitching that I like Re-Animator more than Return of the Living Dead. To that guy, I say, "Feel free to harass me again. I still like one better than the other. And your mother was still better than your sister."

Zombie Love

You'll note that I haven't added 28 to the list yet. I like to to let my zombie films percolate a bit. And no, I didn't "forget" Redneck Zombies or Chopper Chicks in Zombietown or Resident Evil. If they aren't here, it's because I didn't want them. Deal with it. Incidentally, 20-6 are in random order; the top five are my faves.

20) Return of the Living Dead: See, I like it! Although people who think it's a Romero film need a knee in the sac. Best bits: Monique Gabrielle as a nude zombie, and of course, "More Brains!" and "Send More Cops!" Great ending too.

19) Return of the Living Dead 2 &3: These two films don't rate an entry separately, but they have enough good bits to make for a look. Part Deux cheerfully rehashes the first film, while part three gets a bit too serious after the humor of the first two.

18) White Zombie: Featuring Bela Lugosi staring really hard, this is one of the oldest zombie flicks. You can actually find this on DVD, paired with The Devil Bat, for a mere $3.99 at most chain department stores in their Halloween dump bin.

17) The Serpent and the Rainbow: Wes Craven's stab at a film about voodoo based a book that deal's with a man's real experiences in Haiti. Nice creepy set pieces.

16) Cemetary Man: This is a fine, mystifying movie. CM traces the story Victor Dellamorte (Rupert Everett), a cemetery caretaker who patiently and methodically slaughters the undead that rise from his graveyard seven days after they're buried. Why? Who knows? The first half of the film rejoices in Everett's Bruce Campbell-esque crusade. Then suddenly, almost as if Sam Raimi tags in David Lynch to direct the flick, everything takes that sharp left turn as Victor's mind begins to fragment and we aren't sure if he's going mad or actually making sense. I still don't understand the ending, but the ride there is a breathtaker.

15) Night of the Comet: The only zombie flick that boasts Girls Just Wanna Have Fun on the soundtrack. Cute '80s mall-chick Catherine Mary Stewart must fight off zombies created by a comet. Turns out anyone inside metal lined rooms at the time were same. Swell. That means everyone in prison everywhere was okay.

14) Carnival of Souls: Another classic with disturbing images of dancing corpses as a woman wanders the line between the world of the dead and the living. Good stuff.

13) Night of the Living Dead: The Remake: An '80s color remake of the original classic, starring Babylon 5 babe Patricia Tallman as Barbara and Candyman Tony Todd as Ben. Directed with brutal ablomb by Tom Savini, it's not as good of the original but has some great deviations. I should also note that you must avoid the "special edition" recut/abortion/abomination/bastardization of the original version that's floating about. It sucks so bad that you can use the DVD to clean your carpet.

12) Day of the Dead: The last of Romero's trilogy isn't that great. But it's still George, so check it out. The new DVD treatment does it right.

11) Prince of Darkness: This John Carpenter film only tangentially involves zombies, but it's scary as hell. One of my favorite horror flicks, it has roach-reanimated corpses, demonically possessed homeless people, Donald Pleasance as a priest, an abandoned church as the setting and tons of style. It's thought-provoking and unsettling. The "broadcasts" will give you nightmares. A creepiness factor of ten, and overwhelming evidence that Evil Incarnate is real. Some critics don't get it, but as Stephen King points out adequately in Danse Macabre, a lot of film critics aren't equipped to deal with horror films. Sad, but true.

10) The Fog: Another John Carpenter mind-blower. Starring scream-queens Jamie Lee Curtis and Adrienne Barbeau, The Fog has an unbelievable opening ghost story by John Houseman that will turn you white. I remember seeing this for the first time on ABC when I was a little kid and it completely scared the crap out of me. With sword-wielding corpses shambling from the mists, this one will also bother you for a long, long time. I used to live by a lake, and man, some days that steam out there just wasn't cool. Not to sound like a broken record, but the DVD version of this is prime.

9) Re-Animator: Based on the writings of H.P. Lovecraft and featuring a genuine horror hero in mad doctor Herbert West, Re-Animator is actually a fun zombie flick. Great disgusting special effects abound, the most special of which is Barbara Crampton's (of CBS soap fame) natural charms, though the nudity is crouched among the fact that she's being molested by a severed head. Ah well; win some, lose some limbs.

8) Zombie: A foreign-made extrapolation on Romero, Zombie (pronounced SOM-BAY) is all gore, all the time. Zombie vs. Shark! See a magnificent last stand! See your girlfriend never speak to you again if you make her watch it!

7) Evil Dead: The original classic. ED1 is one of the best guerrilla-student films ever and introduced the legendary Bruce Campbell to the world. A work of sublime genius from Sam Raimi, who went on to direct that comic book movie that I hear did pretty well. You must see this one if only for the tree scene, which is still disturbing.

6) Night of the Living Dead: The granddaddy of them all, but still not quite the best. George Romero's cult classic that launched a thousand zombie movies. We all know the story of a group of people fending off an assault by walking corpses from a remote farmhouse. Look deeper for the parallels to Vietnam and the final, devastating comment on racism. The black and white only makes it better.

5) South Park's Halloween Episode: Okay, so it's not a movie, but a work of beauty is a joy forever. Working in references to Romero, Raimi and Michael Jackson's Thriller, this hilarious episode of an already funny series stands severed-head and shoulders above any other series lame-ass Halloween episodes. And if you don't believe me, your mother's on the cover of Crack Whore Magazine.

4) Army of Darkness: The third of Raimi's Evil Dead flicks, AOD sets new standards in the melange of horror and comedy. Our hero Ash (the erstwhile Bruce Campbell) has been bounced back to mediEVIL times to do battle with the Deadites yet again. With miles of attitude and line after line of hysterical dialogue, Campbell turns in a colossal performance. Bruce, you're the king, baby.

3) Dead Alive aka Brain Dead: Before hobbits, Peter Jackson gave us zombie sex, a zombie infant, a zombie-dispatching lawnmower, a zombie-making Sumatran rat monkey, and a zombie-bashing kung-fu fighting clergyman who kicks ass for the Lord. I'm not kidding. Peter Jackson crosses the line from screamingly scary and screamingly funny so many times he does everything but rope cattle with it. A total triumph, and a precursor of the mad imagination that he finally set loose upon Middle Earth.

2) Dawn of the Dead: The ultimate grim vision of a zombie apocalypse. Romero puts his protagonists in the middle of a fortified mall and lets the terror build as legions of walking dead try to get in. You know they will, but what you can't predict is that human greed plays a part in the horrific climax. Eerie, mounting fear fills each frame. Brutally filmed and frighteningly realistic, this is a true nightmare-giver. I'm torn about the idea of a "re-make"; I love this flick and I kind of hate the idea, but at least it has a great cast. We'll know in March.

And now, the champion . . .

1) Evil Dead 2: Dead by Dawn: The only zombie flick that you can really classify as a party movie. It's Campbell again as Ash in the movie that makes the chainsaw the ultimate zombie-dispatching tool. Raimi throws so much at you, it's hard to assimilate. We've got severed hands, swallowed eyeballs and books bound in human flesh. It's a full-scale assault on the senses and the sense of humor. An all-time classic, and the film that Spin magazine once named the number one movie of my generation.

Well there ya' go! I know I've covered some of that ground before, but I loves them zombies. An arguement could made that Dario Argento's Demons is a zombie flick, but I DQ it on the name. Nonetheless, a true horror fan should seek that one out too, if only for the sword-swinging motorcyclist.

I'll be back VERY soon with more Halloween musings.

Troy Brownfield is the Editor-in-Chief of Shotgun Reviews. Neil Wright reminds you; when the zombies begin to march, head for Meijer. Email Troy at psikotyk@aol.com

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