Land of the Dead

Herald rating: **

Reviver of the zombie movie in 1968, George A. Romero unearths the fourth flick in a franchise that, like his career, has been buried for almost 20 years.

Now, the living dead are learning to communicate and make plans, and have all but taken over an American city reminiscent of Pittsburgh, Romero's hometown and frequent location.

The remaining humans live behind fences, caught in their own civil war between the haves and the have-nots.

The haves live in a luxury high-rise called Fiddler's Green, which provides all their needs, so they don't need to go down to the city. At the base of their tower the have-nots are huddled for protection against the zombies raids. Occasionally they send out mercenaries in Dead Reckoning, a giant armoured truck, to find food and fuel.

High in Fiddler's Green, Kaufman (Dennis Hopper), a Donald Trump clone, has cornered what remains of the economy and runs the mercenaries through his sensible lieutenant, Riley (Simon Baker). Cholo (John Leguizamo) is one of Riley's best men.

Cholo's ambition is to move into Fiddlers Green. Kaufman doesn't want his type there; Cholo is more valuable to him on the outside, for Big Daddy (Eugene Clark) is using his new-found abilities to organise the zombies and march on the city. When Cholo, seeking revenge, steals Dead Reckoning and goes on the run, all hell breaks loose.

Be warned: it's likely the most gory horror film to come out of a Hollywood studio, and there's little need to go into deeper detail here.

At the same time, Romero underpins the blood and guts with commentary on the inequities of capitalism and the class warfare that it breeds.

Romero goes into greater depth about his movie-making technique on a DVD commentary track with his editor, Michael Doherty, and producer, Peter Grunwald.

The Remaining Bits contains several deleted scenes (save 'em till the kids have gone to bed); there's a conventional making-of, Undead Again; Leguizamo introduces his playmates in A Day with the Living Dead.

A nice touch for fans of contemporary horror movies is When Shaun Met George, with Shaun of the Dead buddies Simon Pegg and Edgar Wright meeting their idol in Toronto.

* DVD, Video rental today