Night of the Living Dead (1968/1990)

So begins the first of my video Halloween special series! Where every Halloween (Admittedly theres only been one so far…but hey! you live and learn!) I try to upload a series of videos either based on a monster theme or based on the season of Halloween itself!

Last years theme was “Of the dead” and dealt with 5 films featuring those architypical returners of the dead themselves, Zombies! Zombies as a trend have been dead now for years…quite possibly even a decade at this point. Zombies and Vampires have both pretty much been quite literally done to death since the turn of the century and I cant envision anything bringing them storming back to the mainstream public conciousness any time soon…

However! I’ve really wanted to talk about the initial 3 Romero zombie movies now for years and I thought with it being Halloween and there being so much to discuss about these specific zombie films…Well, the planets kind of aligned for me on this one.

The biggest problem I remember having with this review in particular was deciding which version to actually talk about…I’ve found that the ’68 versions been quite literally done to death and the 90’s versions decent but seems to be relatively underrated…One thing I definatley didnt want to do was 2 seperate videos talking about both films seperately but then; How do I cover them both and make it work?

I decided ultimately to cover both films as there own thing but to contrast them off one another when I felt I had something interesting to say about both or either one in particular…And while I feel I maybe could have gone a bit more in depth on the 60’s version in hindsight…at the time I just felt like it had been given enough of a platform over the 90’s version which just didnt seem all that well known…

(For the record: I still prefer the 90’s version over the 60’s version…I just find it has so much more to offer…)

Eraserhead (1977)

This was the first David Lynch film I chose to review on my channel and I chose it for a couple of reasons, first and formost I’m a massive fan of Lynch’s work (In particular all his works in “Twin Peaks”, Blue Velvet and Inland Empire…even if that last one is a bit overly long) his style is so unusual and tonally interesting it’s quite literally like walking into a dream/nightmare over which you have no control. Things just happen in Lynch’s films. they happen because things dont have to have a reason, life doesnt necissarily have a purpose and we’re all here just trying to give our lives a function till we expire. (A bit dark but yeh).

Lynch Straddles the line between Mainstream cinema and experimental video art and while he’s never quite been fully accepted into the mainstream. It could be argued that by many he is seen as the ambassador for experimental film to “Normal people” a wayward guide showing that the hard rules of storytelling and film making arnt actually as solid as first thought.

This subversive nature was what drew me into film making in the first place and what attracted me to video art ultimately…Eraserhead to me could be seen as the Catalyst that led me to where I am today so ultimately im very grateful to the “Lynch’s” of the world and we desperately need more subversive creative types in these modern turbulant times.

I also chose Eraserhead because; well. it’s a just plain weird experimental film. and when I think of Art house and experimental cinema my mind instantly flicks to anything from the chicken baby to the lady in the radiator to that surreal and mesmorising shot that is the films poster. The Red Triangle as a format exists to cover the kind of films that I cant do on TYTD. more extreme horror movies, Video nasties, erotic cinema, art house films. Stuff that I just wouldnt feel like I was doing justice placing it next to the likes of “Ring of Terror” or “Let’s ruin Dads day” and Eraserhead definitely deserves being in my “Red Triangle” series. This is another one that I kind of feel a bit mixed about in terms of my review. I feel like I didnt really fully nail down why I love this film in this review. I dunno;  I just kind of feel like I maybe could have said more…so I may end up revisiting this one again in future…But yeh! for now; enjoy! and I’ll be looking to do more Lynch in future!

(One dose of nightmare fuel and insecurity about parenthood comin’ riiiiiight up!)