Lucio Fulci is Rated X: Zombie

With the release of Zombie, Lucio Fulci entered three visual touchstones into the zombie pop-culture lexicon: the image of the zombie that graces the poster art with an eye socket full of maggots, a zombie slowly pulling a victim’s eye through a splinter of a door, and the underwater fight between a zombie and a shark. As time fades on and you forget the details of this zombie classic, you'll likely start referring to this movie as “the one with the splinter though the eye” or more commonly “the one where the zombie fights a shark”, and this begs a question: Why didn't the idea of underwater zombie ever take off?




George A. Romero ran with the underwater zombie in Land of the Dead and Max Brooks addresses the idea (as does Shock Wave apparently, though I have not yet watched it), but it's strange more modern zombie movies aren't embracing the water-mobile zombie. Possibly the idea adds too much cost to production (I imagine makeup that holds up underwater isn't cheep, nor are underwater stunt people). But what if the underwaterness was used as premise to the story rather than mere sight gags. A deserted island could easily be over run by a water logged horde, a cargo ship could pick up what they thought was a man-overboard, a shipwrecked crew could see what could perhaps appear to be their saviors slowly lumbering from the depths of the ocean...

So, I guess what I'm driving at is this: while you're enjoying Zombie and all it's quintessential contributions to the zombie cannon, fantastic gore, and makeup effects, take notes and write a screenplay that dictates the next direction in zombie horror. Why not? What else are you going to do on a Wednesday afternoon?

Lucio Fulci is Rated X:

Zombie

Mon, Oct 05, 7:00 & 9:00
Tue, Oct 06, 7:00 & 9:00

@ Trylon microcinema, tickets $8 (or snag a discount card at $25 for 5 movies!)