Dawn of the Dead (1979) analysis- zombies retake the mall

This scene from Dawn of the Dead (DOTD 1979) occurs at the end of the film when the zombies retake and stumble through the mall from the survivors as they are let in by the bikers.  A wide shot is used here to show the entire mall and connote that the zombies walking round are similar to normal people walking round and exploring the mall. The zombies reflect our ‘pure motorised instinct’, as quoted from the film, and even though they’re dead they’re walking around the mall it could be compared to people having a “pure motorised instinct” for the desire to buy and represent our consumerist nature. This can be especially true when applying historical context with events such as Black Friday that draw in huge crowds of people to buy goods at cheaper prices.

The mall also has bright and motivated lighting to give the mall connotations of friendliness and attract people to shop there. The left hand third of the frame is lit more brightly which represents that Romero is showing consumerism to be evil and tempting as the right hand third of the frame has more low key lighting. The centre frame shows the clock, and at the top, the red clock face. Red is used in films to connote danger and in this sense represents that time has run out and the zombies have retaken the mall from the survivors.

Bazin’s theory of “The Genius of the System” states that a film’s success is down to a combination of factors. Applying it to Dawn of the Dead we can see that as it’s a horror that features body horror, has a successful auteur, George A. Romero and the fact that it was relevant to the historical context of the time it was able to be a commercial success and gain $55,000,000 Worldwide from a (reputed) small budget of $650,000.

Romero challenges the norm and puts across his own sardonic representation of the world at a time of general depression in the USA, where it was recovering from the Vietnam War and Watergate.  Romero aimed to represent how consumerism and new shopping malls were being used as escapism from this at the time of the historical context and highlights how it can make us “zombies. “This can be shown by Stephen’s ‘It’s ours, we took it’ line as the bikers invade representing that he’s become addicted with consumerism, resulting in him losing his life in the process. Contrapuntal “Musak”, by the Goblins, reinforces Romero’s representation of consumerism to be ultimately ridiculous.