MOVIE REVIEW: Diary of the Dead

George Romero's newest addition to his zombie series follows the video diary trend (like The Blair Witch Project or Cloverfield), telling the story of a crew of young adults filming a low-budget horror movie when the dead begin coming back to life. With the world in turmoil, the director of the film decides it is his duty to document the horror.

Diary of the Dead is nowhere near as effective as The Blair Witch Project or Cloverfield. This film doesn't look as if it was shot with a camcorder like the other two. It looks like a regular movie, except he zooms in and out a lot and sets the camera down a couple of times.

The film is narrated by one of the main characters. She explains that she edited the film, adding music for effect and her narration. This ruins everything that made other 'documentary' films successful. They actually feel as if you're watching the horrors unfolding and seeing the characters' real emotions.

The characters in Diary of the Dead are like robots, rarely showing emotion. Especially the guy filming the movie. At first I felt sorry for him and how the rest of the crew kept giving him a hard time about documenting everything (which happens during the whole movie). Until one of his friends was being chased by a zombie and he just kept filming instead of helping her. What kind of a person would do that?

The characters are also stupid. Obviously they've never seen any zombie movies. They insist on keeping dead loved ones around, just in case they come back to life and are normal. Yeah, obviously if someone who was dead came back to life, they wouldn't be back to their usual self.

And the dialogue is stupid, especially the narration. Here's a quote:

"Are we worth saving? You tell me."

The narrator says this after mentioning how cruel people were for shooting a zombie in the head. Are you kidding me? Yes, the whole human race deserves to die because they're nothing but horrible zombie-killers. Give me a break...

Diary of the Dead was dull, there was no suspense at all, and the gore was pretty tame for a zombie flick. This movie really has nothing going for it, so I give it 1/5.

Rating: 1/5