Here, Romero’s world contains strains of humanity (probably detritus on exodus from the City) that, as demonstrated by their lack of respect for the zombies, could be justifiably considered “worse” than death. As least in the first film, opposition didn’t equal antagonism. Again, the way Romero portrays the roving gang is a distinct retraction from how, for instance, he painted Karl Hardman’s tantrum-prone Harry Cooper character in Night. Eventually the gang breaks through the barricades (and, somehow, the moat of zombies still drawn to the mall because, according to one character, it reminds them of something they used to need) and anarchically turn the film upside down, transgressively taunting the zombies, stealing their jewelry, smashing their pusses with cream pies, and chopping their heads off for sport, not survival. Once the four make unto themselves an idyllic paradise inside the mall, cleansing it of zombies and sealing if off for themselves, they inevitably cave in to the buyer’s delight, so buried in furs, guns, diamonds, and leather (and, ludicrously, cash) that they ultimately end up oblivious to the approaching motorcycle gang that threatens to crash the party. The mall, in essence, shoulders the burden of their identity. Romero’s distinctly Pittsburghian sensibilities can’t be underestimated when explaining Dawn’s appeal the Monroeville Mall perfectly evokes the feel of a hollow monument standing at the center of a community that couldn’t be bothered to define itself any more distinctively than could be represented by their choice between Florsheim or Kinney’s shoes. Like much of America in era, Dawn’s pampered protagonists abandon the unpredictable, ethnically diverse city in favor of the comforting anonymity of suburban USA-specifically, the suburban mall at which they land and eventually inhabit. Night’s besieged would-be survivors were trapped in a rural farmhouse, and their only hope for survival was represented by the hope for escape to the City. Two SWAT cops and a pair of young lovers from the city TV station hop aboard a helicopter and seek refuge somewhere, anywhere away from the volatile wasteland of their urban environment. Dawn begins more or less at the same point that Night left off, with chaos reigning and a fragmented populace suicidally dividing itself over how to handle the zombie invasion (though the social concerns of the ‘60s are notably in the distant past).
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