Dawn of the Dead 47th Anniversary was yesterday!

By Undefeated-Smiles

Today on May 24th, 1978 one of the most influential and greatest genre defining horror classics was put onto the big screen that both shocked audiences and made them laugh at the dark sinister humor laying in

Fun facts about the movie:

Gene Siskel and Roger Ebert were huge fans of the film due to its social commentary, fun action pace and the horror atmosphere it brought to the screen. They were normally against horror movies with a thumbs down for their reviews.

They were harsh against Day Of The Dead calling it just another dumb, spectacle splatter fest but only later on in the years they reverted their review by saying they misunderstood the themes and called it a great horror social commentary genre film as well.

The SWAT/Investigation uniforms that Peter and Roger use in the Ghetto Raid scenes were the large inspiration and influence on the design of Capcoms Resident Evil 2 which they used to make Leon S. Kennedys iconic R.P.D. uniform for the game as a tribute.

Capcom would use Dawn Of The Dead as a large influence to develop the game Dead Rising later on.

Quinten Tarantino has gone on record that he loves the film and thinks the apartment raid is absolutely terrifying.

They used Blue makeup which was suppose to be grey because they had assumed it was going to be black and white and when not they left it in there.

This is the only film in the franchise where we see zombies run. The children that attack Peter in the small location is where it happens.

The child shooting sequence made Ken Foree so uncomfortable and actually want to cry due to the horror it presented him.

The Monroeville Mall was used a place to tribute all zombie films including George A. Romero with a bust but now will be torn down in favor of a Walmart or something which has had a petition going against it.

The crew worked over night for the movie and often forgot to clean up the viscera and in the daytime as the place was opened, there would be gore and blood around LOL.

Most of the death scenes happened on the spot as they were thought of such as the screwdriver and more.

Originally the ending was going to have Francine jump into the helicopter blades and have her head cut open, while Peter shot himself. This was changed in favor of a more optimistic yet hopeful ending[that’s still pretty bleak imo]

The Francine original ending dummy was used for the Ghetto Raid where the zombie has his head shot off by Willie, with fake beards and makeup used on it

The actor who portrayed Steven aka Flyboy improvised the sideways looking foot which made his zombie performance so much more disgusting.

Tom Savini who did the makeup/practical Fx played Blades and would cameo as this zombie later on in 2004s Land Of The Dead within the same universe.

Captain Rhodes himself, Joseph Pilato makes a cameo as an ordinary man working with police officers trying to escape via a boat towards an island to escape the hordes and rampaging chaos around.