Diary did it for me

By: theunrulyone
Date: Tuesday, February 19, 2008

When I first heard that the grandmaster of zombies, George A Romero for those of you not in the know, was making another movie for his "Dead" series, I was pretty excited. I could not wait to see what he was going to do with the undead beasts this time around. Then, due to lack of media exposure (Romero returned to his roots on this one and went really low budget with a bunch of no-name actors) I promptly forgot about this movie. Then I was reading a column in a newspaper that mentioned "Diary" was set to be released the next day, and I knew I had to go and watch it opening night.

The movie starts off in some suburb in the mid-west with a television news crew covering a murder suicide. Soon enough the dead rise and start attacking people. The scene with the news crew is an effective opening scene as it establishes several conventions the rest of the movie will use. One: it sets the stage for the first person shaky cam style seen in "The Blair Witch Project" and "Cloverfield." Two, it lets us know right off that we are in a zombie movie. Three, it places appropriate emphasis on the role of the media, and the need for truth. This final convention plays a major role in the film, and is the subtext with which Romero plays the entire movie.

After the opening scene, we switch location and find ourselves watching a woman in a white dress running through some dark woods with a mummy chasing her. My initial reaction was "what is going on here?" Soon enough, though, we learn that we are watching film students make a horror movie. Then there is some expository action as the students (Jason the director, Elliot the editor, Tony the make-up artist who really wants to direct, Tracy the heroine, Professor Maxwell their teacher, Gordo another actor, and Mary another actor) pile into their Winnebago and head to Pittsburg Univeristy where Debra, Jason's girlfriend lives. The reactions to the news on the radio seemed believable to me. Eliot and Jason believe that something has gone wrong, while Tony and some of the others think that it's really nothing.

This haziness of truth in the media is what Romero works with in "Diary of the Dead" and he makes use of conventional media--television and radio--as well as the internet to explore just what truth in media means nowadays. This approach gets a little heavy handed at times, especially with Debra's somewhat melodramatic narration, and the reusing of footage previously seen in the film. Still, Romero makes a poignant point, even if he lacks subtlety.

The group finds Debra,  and more chaos ensues as they try to reach her parents' house in the country where some truly bad stuff happens. After that they head to their friend Ridley's house, he's the guy that played the mummy and raced off home while the rest of the group was deciding whether or not t believe the news reports.

There are a few more things in terms of plot, but I do not want to give too much away, but there are some other things that I want to talk about before I finish my review.

I am not generally a big fan of the shaky cam style. It does not make me feel sick, as it does some others, but it annoys me because I find it limiting for both the film and the audience. Romero uses some interesting tricks to overcome these limitations, though, namely by using more than one camera. This allows for the type of multiple perspective shots that one would find in a more traditional movie.

The acting was pretty good, especially for a cast of no names, and while I did not always feel the terror they were supposed to be experiencing, I could shelve my disbelief most of  the time, which is really all I ask for in a zombie movie.

The movie had its problems--heavy handedness, shaky cam, bad dialogue at times--but overall I enjoyed it and would recommend it to anyone who likes zombies, or Romero.

Click here to read the staff review by Mania.