Dawn of the Dead (1978): Image analysis 1

This scene from Dawn of the Dead (DOTD 1979) shows how George A Romero as an auteur by putting his soul into the film. This also reflects of the historical context of the 1970’s. This was the decade of when ‘malls’ were introduced in the USA. The ‘mall’ were big retail outlets with all different shops within. It shows off consumerism, where people become obsessed with buying and owning stuff. Romero hated the malls. So he used the zombies in such a way to make them mirror society.

 In this scene the zombies are obsessed with the mall, and they always wanting a way in throughout the film. This final montage shows this off. It has many shots of the zombies aimlessly wondering the mall. The zombies represent society. Romero wanted to talk about how people were becoming these zombies, with wondering the mall buying stuff they don’t really need, losing track of time and becoming emotionless.

 This is example of Auteur theory (as written by Andrew Sarris in ‘Notes on the Auteur theory in 1962’) where the director (Romero) puts his soul and ideologies into the film. We can also see this in another Romero film Night of the Living Dead. This portrays his hatred towards racism. He shows this in the final scene where our black hero (a big thing back then in the 60’s) has survived the night, only to be shot by white hillbillies. Although it is seen as bad, it is Romero’s way of saying that racism shouldn’t be around anymore. Killing off the hero not with zombies but by another race was the perfect way to portray it.