by Ben Bussey

Call him the Deadfather; call him the King of the Zombies; call him the creator of the modern horror film, and a pioneer of independent filmmaking; call him a very tall man with unfeasibly large glasses. Most if not all of these labels apply to George Andrew Romero (yes, I admit, I didn’t know till now that’s what the A stood for, and must confess to being underwhelmed; was expecting perhaps Antonin, Algernon or Amadeus). Spewed forth into this world on 4 February 1940, he’s now celebrating his 70th year in this accursed plane of existence, and as such we should all take a moment to express our appreciation. After all, without him, would all us horror geeks even exist?

I should hope this goes without saying, but Night of the Living Dead is one of those movies whose significance really can’t be disputed. Okay, it borrowed liberally from Richard Matheson’s groundbreaking novel I Am Legend, as Romero has long since admitted; and okay, there were earlier 60’s horror films that had adopted a similar overall aesthetic, like Carnival of Souls. But no other film before had brought the horror genre into the modern world with such verve, grit and (of course) guts as Romero’s feature debut did. The level of gore was one thing; the level of emotional realism, nihilistic bleakness and the echoes of the real world that came through in the movie were something else entirely. The contemporary setting; the lack of explanation for the dead rising up; the averageness of the characters, and the casting of an African-American in the lead role with his race never explicitly being made an issue. There can be no question that movie was a trailblazer in hard-hitting, provocative, socially conscious horror, and it’s hard to see how the Cravens, Hoopers, Cronenbergs and Carpenters of this world would be doing what they did after without it. Not to mention, of course, that Night of the Living Dead essentially created the zombie film as we now know it, leading not only to Romero’s own Dead series – Dawn, Day, Land, Diary and now Survival of the Dead – but to literally innumerable living dead imitators, of varying quality.

But I don’t want to dwell too much on the zombies here. That’s all anyone seems to mention nowadays when talking about Romero, which is perhaps why the man himself doesn’t seem to contemplate making anything but more Dead movies now (and, given that this is meant to be a celebration of his work, I’ll sidestep my feelings about Diary of the Dead for the time being). But cast an eye over his back catalogue and it’s clear he’s got so much more to offer. Take Season of the Witch, and how it uses witchcraft to explore the midlife anxiety of a suburban trophy housewife; Martin, and its ambiguous use of vampirism; Knightriders, and its sheer outlandishness. Take Creepshow, surely the finest anthology horror film ever made (as well as one of the best films Stephen King’s been involved in), with its vivid evocation of EC Comics at their most ghoulish, a spirit continued to a large extent in his half of the Argento collaboration Two Evil Eyes. All these movies approached their subject matter from a unique and fresh perspective, giving a jolt of life to their respective subgenres, and at once allowing Romero to vent his contempt for the trappings of society, not only with blood and bile but with often razor sharp wit.

I’ve had the distinct pleasure of meeting Romero, and while as I recall I did the thing I usually do when meeting someone from the movies – by turns, getting completely tongue-tied and then babbling like a buffoon – I did manage to say one key thing with relative clarity: that, short of James Whale coming back from the dead, I could not meet a more significant horror filmmaker. And I stand by that. What Whale did for the first half of the 20th century, Romero did for the latter half – the (pun intended) dark half, if you will. Both directors set the benchmark for quality horror filmmaking, proving that the genre is not the impedement that so many dismiss it as. They demonstrated that is possible to make films that are at once of widespread appeal yet intensely personal, subtle and intellectual whilst not forgoing entertainment value. Not just great horror filmmaking: great filmmaking.

Scarcely a horror film has come by in over forty years in which we cannot detect at least an echo of George A Romero, and I highly doubt that’s about to change. Many happy returns George, and thanks for everything.