Night of the Living Dead (1968): Beat sheet and Review

Opening image: A car driving down a country-side road.

Theme Stated: When the brother says "They're coming to get you Barbara."

Set up: Barbara (Judith O'dea) and her brother, Jonny are visiting her fathers grave to put flowers.

Catalyst: When her brother is killed by the ghoul.

Debate: Barbara is scared and tries to escape in the car.

Break into 2: When she crashes the car and then goes to the farmhouse to hide.

B story: When Ben (Duane Jones) shows up in his truck to the house.

Fun and Games: Where Ben is fighting off the ghouls in the house through the windows.

Midpoint: When Ben and Barbara meet the other people in the house.

Bad guys close in: When the people ran outside and were being chased by the ghouls.

All is lost: Judy and Harry are killed in the truck explosion.

Dark night of the soul: When Tom and Ben fight.

Break into 3: When the zombie girl kills her mother.

Finale: Ben is by himself killing off all the ghouls.

Final image: When Ben comes out the next morning and is accidently killed by the police.

The 1968 film "Night of the Living Dead" was a masterpiece horror film of its time. Directed by George Romero, who also later directed the classics "Dawn of the Dead" and "Day of the Dead", this was the first truly modern horror movie. Because of the time period the film used homemade special effects, mediocre acting, and the grainy black and white filming made it a little cheesy for today's audience but for its time it was one of the best. The violence was something unseen in the horror film industry at that time and changed horror films forever. It showed that the good guys don't always triumph over evil, and all characters, even the liked ones, can be killed just as easily as the bad ones.

Barbara (Judith O'dea) and her brother Johnny (Russell Streiner) were driving to a cemetery to put flowers down for their dead father when they are attacked by a zombie and Johnny is killed. Barbara then escapes to an abandoned farm house where she meets up with Ben (Duane Jones), who has encountered the ghouls before. throughout the movie they are just trying to survive in the house and they meet some new allies in the process. However the story takes a bad turn towards the end. I didn't like the downbeat ending because it leaves kind of a bad taste in your mouth after its over because you would expect more or something different. Despite this I say that this film was a great success for its time period and was a horror film revolution.