Night of the Living Dead is a 1968 American zombie horror film directed, photographed, and edited by George A. Romero, written by Romero and John Russo, and produced by Russell W. Streiner and Karl Hardman. The independent film's ensemble cast—which includes Duane Jones, Judith O'Dea, Marilyn Eastman, Karl Hardman, Judith Ridley, and Keith Wayne—star as a group of people trapped in a farmhouse in rural Pennsylvania, under assault by flesh-eating reanimated corpses. Although the monsters that appear in the film are referred to as "ghouls", they are credited with popularizing the modern portrayal of zombies in popular culture.
Having gained experience creating television commercials, industrial films, and Mister Rogers' Neighborhood segments through their production company The Latent Image, Romero, Russo, and Streiner decided to make a horror film to capitalize on interest in the genre. Their script primarily drew inspiration from Richard Matheson's 1954 novel I Am Legend. Principal photography took place between July 1967 and January 1968, mainly on location in Evans City, Pennsylvania, with Romero using guerrilla filmmaking techniques he had honed in his commercial and industrial work to complete the film on a budget of approximately . Unable to procure a proper set, the crew rented a condemned farmhouse to destroy during the course of filming.
Night of the Living Dead premiered in Pittsburgh on October 1, 1968. It grossed domestically and internationally, earning more than 250 times its budget and making it one of the most profitable film productions of all time. Released shortly before the adoption of the Motion Picture Association of America rating system, the film's explicit violence and gore were considered groundbreaking, leading to controversy and negative reviews. It eventually garnered a cult following and critical acclaim, and has appeared on lists of the greatest and most influential films ever made by such outlets as Empire, The New York Times and Total Film. Frequently identified as a touchstone in the development of the horror genre, retrospective scholarly analysis has focused on its reflection of the social and cultural changes in the United States during the 1960s, with particular attention towards the casting of Jones, an African-American, in the leading role. In 1999, the film was deemed "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant" by the Library of Congress and selected for preservation in the National Film Registry.
Night of the Living Dead created a successful franchise that includes five following films released between 1978 and 2009, all directed by Romero. Since the film was mistakenly created without a copyright notice, it entered the public domain upon release, resulting in numerous adaptations, remakes, and a lasting legacy in the horror genre. An official remake, written by Romero and directed by Tom Savini, was released in 1990.
Plot
Siblings Barbra and Johnny Blair drive to a cemetery in rural Pennsylvania to visit their father's grave, where a pale man in a tattered suit kills Johnny and attacks Barbra. Fleeing to a nearby farmhouse, she finds the resident's corpse lying half-eaten on the stairs. A growing horde of ghouls surrounds the house as a stranger, Ben, arrives and initially mistakes Barbra for the homeowner. After driving back several ghouls, he boards the windows and doors. A traumatized Barbra falls into a near catatonic state, forcing Ben to look after her. While searching the home for supplies, he locates a lever-action rifle upstairs.
Barbra is surprised to find people already taking shelter in the home's cellar. Harry Cooper, his wife Helen, and their young daughter Karen fled there after ghouls overturned their car and bit Karen on the arm, leaving her seriously ill. A teenage couple, Tom and Judy, took shelter after hearing an emergency broadcast while they were at a nearby lake. Tom and Ben secure the farmhouse while Harry protests that it is unsafe aboveground, before returning to the cellar. Tension rises in the group as more of the ghouls arrive to besiege the farmhouse.
Through radio and TV reports, the survivors learn that cannibalistic corpses, referred to as "ghouls", are reanimating and committing mass murder across the East Coast of the United States and that posses of armed men are patrolling the countryside to exterminate the living dead. Reports confirm that the ghouls can die again from heavy blows to the head, bullets to the brain, or being burned. Various rescue centers offer refuge and safety, and scientists theorize that radiation from an exploding space probe returning from Venus caused the reanimations.
Ben devises a plan to obtain medical supplies for Karen and transport the group to a rescue center by refueling his truck at a pump on the farm. Ben, Tom, and Judy drive there together, holding the ghouls off with torches and Molotov cocktails. However, spilled gasoline catches fire and causes the truck to explode, killing Tom and Judy. Ben makes it back, but when Harry refuses to unlock the door, Ben breaks it down.
The remaining survivors debate possible options, pausing when the 3 a.m. news broadcast airs. As they watch the update, the power fails, and the ghouls break through the doors and windows of the unlit home. In the chaos, Harry grabs Ben's gun to threaten him, but is disarmed and shot by Ben. Harry staggers down to the cellar and dies beside his daughter. Barbra awakens from her delirium and saves Helen from the ghouls, who then flees to the cellar.
Karen dies from her injuries, becomes a ghoul, feeds on her father's remains, and stabs her mother to death with a masonry trowel. Barbra tries to help Ben keep the ghouls out, but freezes upon seeing the reanimated Johnny, who drags her into the horde. As the horde pours into the farmhouse, Ben retreats to the cellar, where he shoots the reanimated Harry and Helen.
In the morning, an armed posse arrives to dispatch the remaining ghouls. Awakened by their gunfire, Ben emerges from the cellar, but, mistaking him for a ghoul, the posse shoots him. His body is thrown onto a bonfire and burned with the other corpses.
Cast
The low-budget film featured no well-known actors, but it propelled several cast members' careers. Two independent film companies from Pittsburgh—Hardman Associates and director George A. Romero's The Latent Image—combined to form Image Ten, a production company chartered only to create Night of the Living Dead. The cast consisted of members of Image Ten; actors previously cast in their commercials; clients who commissioned commercials; local TV, radio, and law enforcement; acquaintances of Romero, production crew and their relatives; and Pittsburgh stage actors. Duane Jones as Ben. The casting was potentially controversial in 1968 when it was rare for a black actor to be cast as the hero of an American film with a predominantly white cast, but Romero said Jones gave the best audition. Jones later appeared in other films, including Ganja & Hess (1973) and Beat Street (1984). Judith O'Dea as Barbra Blair. A 23-year-old commercial and stage actress, O'Dea had previously worked for Hardman and Eastman in Pittsburgh. She was in Hollywood pursuing a film career when contacted about the role. O'Dea expressed surprise at the film's cultural impact and the recognition it brought her. Russell Streiner as Johnny Blair, Barbra's brother. Streiner, Romero's business partner at The Latent Image, was one of the film's producers. In the film's credits, he is listed solely as a producer. Despite having no prior film acting experience, Streiner went on to act in and produce other films, notably the 1990 remake, where he also had a cameo appearance as Sheriff McClelland. Karl Hardman as Harry Cooper. Hardman was president of Hardman Associates and one of the film's producers. Cooper's wife was played by Hardman's real-life business and romantic partner, Marilyn Eastman. Hardman also remixed the film's sound track and created sound effects. Marilyn Eastman as Helen Cooper. Vice president of Hardman Associates, Marilyn Eastman played Helen Cooper and the unnamed, bug-eating zombie. She later appeared in Santa Claws (1996), directed by John Russo. Kyra Schon as Karen Cooper. Hardman's daughter in real life, nine-year-old Schon also portrayed the mangled corpse on the house's upper floor that Ben drags away. Keith Wayne as Tom. "Keith Wayne" was Ronald Keith Hartman's stage name. After this lone acting role, Wayne went on to work as a singer, dancer, musician, and night-club owner, before becoming a chiropractor in North Carolina. Wayne explained the change in careers during a 1992 interview, "I am not that person anymore. [...] I got to a point in my life where I wanted to have some control. I didn't want to wake up at 40 or 50 and not be in control." In 1995, he took his own life at age 50. Judith Ridley as Judy. A 19-year-old receptionist from Hardman Associates, Ridley auditioned for Barbra without any acting experience and was given the less-demanding role of Judy. Ridley starred in Romero's second feature There's Always Vanilla (1971). Bill Hinzman as the cemetery ghoul. Hinzman played the first ghoul encountered by Barbra and Johnny in the cemetery and later worked on several horror films including The Majorettes (1986) and Flesheater (1988). George Kosana as Sheriff McClelland. Kosana also served as the film's production manager. Bill "Chilly Billy" Cardille as himself. Cardille was well known in Pittsburgh as the horror host of the anthology series Chiller Theatre. His daughter Lori later starred in Romero's Day of the Dead (1985).
Production Development and pre-production
George Romero embarked upon his career in the film industry while attending Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh. He directed and produced television commercials and industrial films for The Latent Image, a company he co-founded with his friend Russell Streiner. The Latent Image started small, but after producing a high-budget Calgon commercial spoofing Fantastic Voyage (1966), Romero felt that the company had the experience and equipment to produce a feature film. They wanted to capitalize on the film industry's "thirst for the bizarre", according to Romero. He, Streiner, and John A. Russo contacted Karl Hardman and Marilyn Eastman, president, and vice president respectively, of a Pittsburgh-based industrial film firm called Hardman Associates, Inc. The Latent Image pitched their idea for a then-untitled horror film.
These discussions led to the creation of Image Ten, a production company chartered to produce a single feature film. The initial budget was $6,000; each member of the production company invested $600 for a share of the profits. Ten more investors contributed another $6,000, but this was still insufficient. Production stopped multiple times during filming while Romero used early footage to persuade additional investors. Image Ten eventually raised approximately $114,000 for the budget ($ today).
Writing
The script was co-written by Russo and Romero. They abandoned an early horror comedy concept about adolescent aliens, after realizing they would not have the budget to create a convincing spaceship. Russo proposed a more constrained narrative where a young man runs away from home and discovers aliens harvesting human corpses for food in a cemetery. Romero combined this idea with an unpublished short story about flesh-eating ghouls, and they began filming with an incomplete script. According to Russo, the screenplay written prior to filming only covered events up to the emergence of the Cooper family. Russo completed the script while filming and Romero later expanded the final pages of his short story into the sequels Dawn of the Dead (1978) and Day of the Dead (1985).