George Romero’s Dawn of the Dead is both a career high for the director and one of the most influential horror films ever made. It’s often forgotten, however, that it more or less owes its existence to another genre luminary, the Italian giallo director Dario Argento. Argento had made a name for himself throughout the 70s as both a producer and a director, through stylish slashers such as Profondo Rosso and Suspiria. Argento agreed to finance a sequel to Romero’s seminal Night of the Living Dead, inviting him to his house in Rome to write the script – and in return, Argento would be allowed to produce his own cut of the movie for release in Europe. Under the title Zombi: Dawn of the Dead (or simply “Zombies” in the UK), the film was a massive success in Europe and kick-started the Italian zombie cycle that led to a slew of unofficial sequels cashing in on the ‘Zombi’ title – most notably Lucio Fulci’s Zombi 2. Whilst its influence was immediate, Argento’s version was superceded internationally by Romero’s US cut, and has only recently been exhumed (in the US) on DVD.
Romero has often said that he prefers to shoot lots of material and then assemble a film in the edit, rather than work tightly to the script. Given this method of working, Argento’s own edit is – on paper at least – an intriguing prospect. Not only is the film shorter, it contains many alternative scenes and has a substantially different rhythm – some shots last a little longer here, we get a different angle there, sometimes a line sounds very different. In practice, the result is certainly interesting, but not altogether successful. Those hoping to see an exciting mix of two very different directorial styles will be disappointed; the film is still unmistakeably Romero’s, and his shooting style sits rather uncomfortably with Argento’s editing priorities. Romero’s films are often comprised of extremely short shots which are designed to take in the small details of a situation (best example: the stuffed animal heads on the wall of the mall’s gun shop), while the narrative pace is allowed to develop slowly. Argento clearly wants to crank up the action and the tension by fast-cutting the film but Romero’s unusual close-ups and cutaways don’t really allow him to do this – there aren’t really enough expansive action shots, and the result is a sense that Argento is trying to bend the material into a shape which is doesn’t really want to go. Occasionally, the editing feels clumsy, particularly in Fran and Steven’s first meeting with Peter and Roger and their departure in the helicopter, which doesn’t make a whole lot of sense.
Probably the biggest problem is the music. Argento binned all the library music that Romero used, using only cues from Goblin’s specially composed score (Romero’s cut mixes the two). It’s a great score, but really lacks any of the softer or more subtle moments that the library tracks bring. Crucially, there really isn’t enough music to stretch across the entire film, so cues are used repeatedly to the point where they become tiresomely intrusive; worse, the relentless synth-rock pummelling occasionally feels wildly mismatched with the action on screen. Parts of Zombi feel rather like a music video, as if Argento is cutting to the music rather than vice-versa.
The ‘new’ material itself is interesting but inessential, and most of its appeal lies more in its novelty factor than in anything of value it brings to the story. Zombi is not in itself a disaster – it’s basically the same great movie but with some different cuts – but it’s not nearly as good as the US version, plain and simple. I’d recommend it to hardened Dawn fans because it does offer a different take on some very familiar material, but it’s value is probably more academic than anything else: it’s a great lesson in how editing can make or break a film. It would be over ten years until Romero and Argento worked again – on the not massively popular Edgar Allen Poe adaptation Two Evil Eyes – and even then they just took one half of the film each. Ultimately, you’re probably best just to watch Suspiria and Romero’s cut back to back.