Land of the Dead: Collector's Edition - Blu-ray Review

[Michael Scott]

Land of the Dead: Collector's Edition



Movie:
Video:
Audio:
Extras:
Final Score:


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Movie
Ah, George Romero back in the saddle again. Just one year after Zack Snyder remade Dawn of the Dead, Romero came back to his “of the dead” series to write and direct an all new horror splat fest. Land ranked as one of the biggest budgeted films the director had tackled yet, with a 3x budget from what he had employed in the last three “of the dead” films in his repertoire. It was hyped and pushed as the most boundary pushing film that he had made to date, but sadly only made about 47 million dollars in the box office. The film centered around social issues like greed and selfishness of the rich in their ivory towers, but also blended in slapstick style humor that felt strangely at odds with the seriousness of the zombie gut munching and the commentary. Most viewers were left with a rather quizzical look on their faces by the time the movie ended, and the movie just hasn’t aged as well as others in his database of works. Personally I find it to be an extremely guilty pleasure of mine, as the hamminess falls into the “so bad its actually good” category for this reviewer, and just roll with the insane punches.

It’s been quite a few years since the dead woke up and became the undead, and they have been taking over the world piece by piece. The last remnants of humanity are holed up in giant cities with most of the populace living in squalor, while a few rich and powerful members of society drain them of all the resources and live like kings in a giant tower called Fiddler’s Green. People like Mr. Kaufman (Dennis Hopper) sit in rich palaces with money, women, power and complete control of the city, while the rest of the people beg and barter for a good meal, or indulge their harsher vices in zombie fight betting. Riley Denbo (Simon Baker) is a lackey for Kaufman, heading up the team of mercs that sweeps the countryside for supplies and foodstuffs that are left in the crumbled world that is over run by the undead hordes. However, he’s ready for retirement as the guy just wants out of the business. Just before he’s about to hand the reins over to the impetuous Cholo (John Leguizamo) things get crazy.

The undead have started to gain a semblance of intelligence. Lead by a hulking beast of a zombie, the flesh eating monsters are starting to “remember” some of their lives workings, and are drawn inexorably towards Fiddler’s Green and the rest of humanity. To make matters MUCH worse, Cholo has become jaded at how Kaufman and his ilk treat him, and decides that he’s going to take his revenge by holding the city ransom for millions. If Kaufman doesn’t give in to his financial demands, Cholo is going to use the Dead Reckoning (a state of the art armored mobile weapons platform that Riley has been using as his command vehicle) to blow up the city, letting millions die and even more to be eaten by the incoming zombie horde. Now, it’s up to Riley and a hooker named Slack (Asia Argento) to stop Cholo from doing the unthinkable, and save the city from the every intelligent zombies coming their way.

Land of the Dead feels authentic in the way the humans have learned to survive. They are huddled in armored, protected, cities and all they have left is the powerful, but crude, weapons left to them from their old life. Scavenging has become the only way they survive in a world where they are the minority for once, and the bleak look of how they live under the thumb of the powerful and rich falls in line with how multiple societies have lived for thousands of years. The part where it gets out of hand is the execution of key points in the film by Romero. The social commentary about greed and money is all well and good, but it lacks the punch of reality as Cholo and Kaufman are all worried about money in a world where supplies and bartering would be kind. It just seems disingenuous that they would be so focused on money in a place where it’s hard to spend it. The same goes for the growing intelligence of the zombies. If it was played seriously I could see the point of using it as a point of terror, but the film makes a point to have it so hammy and slapstick that it comes off more like a three stooges version of a zombie film rather than a serious movie at times.

With that being said, the movie is still a goofy good time. I fully admit that Land of the Dead is a weak entry into the “of the dead” universe, but it’s a wildly entertaining piece that derives most of its fun from being so bad that it’s goofily fun. The action is non stop, and the audio mix is simply to die for. Simon Baker is a bit miscast as Riley, but John Leguizamo ALWAYS delivers the goods with his quirky portrayal of the “over the top” Cholo. Asia Argento is a bit flat, but the gorgeous Italian actress isn’t exactly known for being more more than “punk” eyecandy in her films (I always wondered what happened to her after xXx and Land of the Dead, as she seemed to just vanish).




Rating:

Rated R for pervasive strong violence and gore, language, brief sexuality and some drug use




Video:

The theatrical presentation for Land of the Dead has been given a new 2K scan of the internegative, while the Unrated cut of the movie was just given a boost from VC-1 to AVC. Honestly, comparing both of them side by side, I have to say they look fairly similar. The theatrical looks a little bit better than the older master that spawned the Unrated cut, with a tighter grain structure and a little bit better saturated colors. The cool blue of the film gives it a slightly dusky look, coupled with the dark and gloomy night time exterior shots. Fine detail is excellent between both, but I can see a little bit cleaner lines and intimate details on clothing in the theatrical. Blacks are deep and inky, and I only noticed some mild black crush in the backgrounds. Personally, I think both cuts are pretty close to each other in quality, as the extra couple of minutes in the unrated cut doesn’t do a whole lot for the film. That being said, I’d opt for viewing the theatrical cut over the unrated due to the increased (if only slightly) picture quality that the new scan adds.





Audio:

Like Dawn of the Dead, Land of the Dead recycles the 5.1 DTS-HD MA mix (with the obligatory 2.0 DTS-HD MA that Shout/Scream puts on their 5.1 discs) from the Universal release, but that’s in NO way a knock on it. The 5.1 DTS-HD MA track is a powerhouse from beginning to end, with a near nonstop bass line that doesn’t stop pulsating and throbbing until the credits stop rolling. Gunshots are deep and weighty, with explosions from the armored trucks and belt fed guns just pummeling the listeners into their seats with non stop LFE. Surrounds are wildly engaged from beginning to end with the chaos of battle, or the moaning and shuffling of undead feet. Dialog is always clean and clear, and the balance between voracious action and spoken word is perfectly balanced. I gave the Universal track a 5/5 when I first reviewed it 9 years ago, and I still do to this day as it eeks out every last bit of ability out of the 5.1 experience.
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Extras:

Disc One: Theatrical Version
• NEW Cholo's Reckoning - an interview with actor John Leguizamo
• NEW Charlie's Story – an interview with actor Robert Joy
• NEW The Pillsbury Factor – an interview with actor Pedro Miguel Arce
• NEW Four of the Apocalypse – an interview with actors Eugene Clark, Jennifer Baxter, Boyd Banks and Jasmin Geljo
• Dream of the Dead documentary: The director's cut with optional commentary by director Roy Frumkes
• Deleted footage from Dream of the Dead
• Deleted Scenes
• Theatrical Trailer
Disc Two: UnCut Version of Film
• NEW Audio Commentary with zombie performers Matt Blazi, Glena Chao, Michael Felsher and Rob Mayr
• Audio Commentary with writer/director George A. Romero, producer Peter Grunwald and editor Michael Doherty
• Undead Again: The Making of Land of the Dead
• Bringing The Dead To Life
• Scenes of Carnage
• Zombie Effects: From Green Screen to Finished Scene
• Scream Test – CGI test
• Bringing the Storyboards to Life
• A Day with the Living Dead hosted by John Leguizamo
• When Shaun Met George

Final Score: ​

Land of the Dead was the point in Romero’s career that his films started spiraling downward. The social commentary wasn’t nearly as impressive as previous entries, and the hammy way that the intelligent zombies were handled was is a bit off putting. However it’s an extremely guilty pleasure of mine, as Romero still has one of the best visual styles in the zombie genre. His use of cool blues, soft blacks and stumbling undead has created a spot for him among the legendary horror directors. This is just one of those “so bad that it’s actually fun” type of movies and clocks in as one of his least impressive films. Scream Factory has done a great job at the new scan, and the re-encode of both discs, and like Dawn of the Dead, upgrading will be dependent on if you like the new collector’s edition packaging and the extras combined with a slight video upgrade. If you HAVEN’T picked up the old Universal Blu-ray, then this is easily the way to go. Fun, but hammy, watch.




Technical Specifications:

Starring: John Leguizamo, Asia Argento, Simon Baker
Directed by: George Romero
Written by: George Romero
Aspect Ratio: 2.39:1 AVC
Audio: English: DTS-HD MA 5.1, English DTS-HD MA 2.0
Studio: Scream Factory
Rated: R
Runtime: 97 Minutes
Blu-ray Release Date: October 24th, 2017

Recommendation: Fun, but Hammy, Watch

 

[tripplej]

Thanks for the review. Will save this for a rainy day once it is on amazon prime/netflix.