The Return of the Living Dead is a 1985 American horror comedy film directed by Dan O’Bannon, written by O’Bannon and Rudy Ricci, and starring Clu Gulager, James Karen, Don Calfa, and Thom Mathews. The film tells the story of a group of people who are trapped in a warehouse with zombies, and must find a way to escape.
The Return of the Living Dead is a fun and gory zombie movie that is sure to please fans of the genre. The acting is decent, the characters are likable, and the zombies are suitably creepy. The movie is also notable for its dark sense of humor, which sets it apart from other zombie movies.
While The Return of the Living Dead is not a perfect movie, it is a lot of fun, and is definitely worth watching.
Synopsis
The Return of the Living Dead is a 1985 American zombie horror comedy film directed by Dan O’Bannon, written by O’Bannon and Rudy Ricci, and starring Clu Gulager, James Karen, Don Calfa, and Linnea Quigley. The film tells the story of a group of people who are trapped in a warehouse with zombies, and features the now-iconic scene in which a zombie eats a human’s brain.
The film opens with two workers at a medical supply warehouse, Frank (Karen) and Freddy (Calfa), discussing the contents of a shipping crate that has just arrived. They open the crate to find a canister labeled “Trioxin”, which they assume is a new type of insecticide. When they open the canister, a green gas escapes and Frank accidentally inhales some of it.
The gas has the strange effect of reanimating the dead, and soon a group of zombies is attacking the people in the warehouse. The group includes a teenage punk rocker named Trash (Quigley), who is bitten by a zombie and begins to turn into one herself. The remaining survivors make their way to the roof of the warehouse, where they are rescued by a helicopter.
The film then jumps ahead to several days later, as the survivors are struggling to deal with what has happened. They are all suffering from nightmares and hallucinations, and Trash has fully transformed into a zombie. The group decides to return to the warehouse to find out what happened to the other zombies, and to see if they can find a way to reverse the effects of the Trioxin gas.
Once they return to the warehouse, they are attacked by a horde of zombies. In the ensuing chaos, Frank is bitten by a zombie and turns into one himself. The group is eventually able to make it back to the roof, but not before Trash has been killed and resurrected as a zombie herself.
The film ends with the survivors being rescued by the military, who take them to a secret government facility for study. The final shot shows Trash, now fully transformed into a zombie, breaking out of her restraints and attacking a soldier.
Movie Details
Director: Dan O’Bannon
Writer: Dan O’Bannon
Actors: Clu Gulager, James Karen, Don Calfa, Linnea Quigley, Beverly Randolph, Miguel A. Núñez Jr., Brian Peck, Thom Mathews, John Philbin, Jewel Shepard, and more.
Release Year: 1985