Midnight Zombie Dance Party 2008
Told you there’d be more zombie posts.
So tonight is going to eat my brains — I’m going with my wife and friend “Evelyn” to see the midnight sneak preview of Diary of the Dead at the Belcourt Theatre, which is (if you’re not geeky enough to already know) the newest zombie opus from George Romero, the Eddie Van Halen of of zombie horror. And to make this event even more telling of how lame I am, Romero himself — Zombie Chief of Staff — will be at the showing to introduce the film, examine Nashville folks, and probably think of new ways to make social commentary out of gratuitous violence and dead folks with voracious appetites.
The wife and I watched Night of the Living Dead last night in the spirit of getting ready for such a marquee event. It’s been a while — I had kind of forgotten how strange the movie is, with almost absolutely no violence in the beginning, and then suddenly — bam! — zombie buffet after the truck blows up due to some REALLY poor gas pump usage. ( I mean, seriously, why hold a torch so close to a gas pump? I know you’re scared, but how do you forget the basic concept of fire + fuel = zombie barbecure?)
I’d also forgotten how non-threatening the zombies seem at first — they’re just kind of chilling outside in the yard, like the folks you usually see standing outside an Olive Garden with the coaster pager, waiting 45 minutes for mediocre ravioli, not looking particularly excited about the meal they’re about to have, just knowing that they can have as much salad and as many breadsticks as they want. Except the breadsticks are appendages, and the salad…. well, there’s no salad in this analogy.
