- Directed by: George A. Romero
- Written by: George A. Romero
- Stars: Lori Cardille, Terry Alexander, Joseph Pilato
- Run Time: 1 Hour,41 Minutes
- Trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=COj7ro8AjT8
Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone
The adventure continues years after the previous movie. The survivors are few, going crazy, and doing the best they can to get by. The practical effects are excellent, the setting is cool, and the cast does a good job. This was still very entertaining 40 years after being made.
Spoilery Synopsis
We open on Dr. Sarah Bowman, who stares at the calendar. She’s not happy, but she likes the picture of the pumpkin field. Suddenly, arms reach out of the walls to grab her– on, just a nightmare. She’s actually in a helicopter flying over a dead city; there’s no sign of life down there, and there is no answer on the radio. John, the pilot, doesn’t want to land, but they need to check it out down there. Credits roll.
On the ground, Sarah and Miguel yell for attention, but no one hears them. No one alive anyway. They soon wake up a whole town full of zombies. They leave and fly back to their base, a military bunker with a chain-link fence holding back huge numbers of the dead. There are only twelve living people left in the base. John suggests taking the helicopter and finding a nice tropical island to settle on, but that would be wrong, Sarah argues. We see that it’s not really a military base, it’s a huge decommissioned mine with underground storage for vehicles, RVs and all sorts of things.
Steel and Rickles grab Sarah and Miguel to go and bring in a couple of zombies. They have a whole chamber full of the dead, so finding them isn’t an issue. They’ve got a whole corral thing set up to isolate individual zombies as needed. Miguel has PTSD, and Sarah tries to cover for him, even when he nearly gets them all killed.
We cut to Captain Rhodes arguing with Dr. Fisher about their experiments. Rhodes has just become the leader of the military group, and he’s not a big supporter of the scientists. They, along with Steel and Rickles, point out that Sarah’s the last woman on Earth. And there are only eleven guys.
The zombies they’ve brought are for “Dr. Frankenstein,” or Dr. Logan, as he prefers, who’s been experimenting on the zombies. He’s dissected many of them, but he’s got a special zombie, Bub, who he’s been “training.” Sarah doesn’t approve of Logan, who isn’t really working to solve their problems. He’s a bit of a lunatic, but he is learning things that might be useful.
They all get together for a meeting, where Bill tells them that the radio’s not able to contact anyone. Rhodes wants to know what the scientists are doing to help the situation– he might be a little power mad. Dr. Logan shows up with a lot of statistics, but Rhodes isn’t impressed.
Sarah and Miguel have a fight, and she throws him out. She goes home with Bill, the radio and electronics guy, who’s living with John in a mobile home way in the back of the underground compound. Sarah points out that neither John nor Bill do much of anything beyond their basic jobs. John explains his point of view; humanity’s over, so why not enjoy the time they have?
Dr. Logan relays the nature of zombies to Ted and Sarah. He wants to reward the zombies for good behavior, Pavlovian-style. He shows the two scientists how Bub the zombie remembers his previous life. Sarah’s more impressed that Bub doesn’t see live people as dinner anymore. Rhodes comes in, and he’s less impressed. Bub salutes Rhodes, which offends Rhodes.
There’s an accident in the corral; several people die, and Miguel gets bit. He runs away, but Sarah gets John to help cut Miguel’s arm off to save him. This causes a whole confrontation with the military guys, and Rhodes says he’s going to kill all the captured zombies in the morning.
Sarah and Bill go to the lab for morphine for Miguel, and they see more of Dr. Logan’s experiments. They come to the conclusion it’s time to take the helicopter and get away while they can. Rhodes comes in and catches Logan feeding Bub pieces of the dead soldiers as a reward for good behavior. Rhodes fills Dr. Logan with holes.
There’s a stand-off at John’s trailer as the army guys want their guns. Rhodes executes Ted to prove a point and then shoves Sarah and Bill into the zombie corral.
As Bill and Sarah run through the tunnels, Steel beats up John. Suddenly, the alarm goes off; the elevator to the outside has gone active. Turns out, Miguel has decided to go outside.
John gets the drop on Rhodes, but he refuses to kill him. Rickles and Steel go to the elevator, but it’s broken. Miguel, meanwhile, has lost his mind and opened the chain-link fence, letting all the zombies inside. He then hops on the elevator and lures them in, pushing the down button as he is swarmed.
Soon, the big elevator comes down, allowing a bunch of the zombies inside. From the opposite direction, the corral zombies have gotten through, leaving Rhodes in the middle with Bub. Bub sees that his friend, Dr. Logan, has been killed, and he’s not happy about it.
Rhodes and Bub have a duel, and that goes badly for Rhodes. Turns out, Bub’s not bad with a pistol. The zombies eat well.
Sarah, John, and Bill run and climb for another way out. They run to the helicopter, start it up, and take off before the monsters get them. Next thing we see, they’re all on a deserted tropical island, as planned.
Brian’s Commentary
This takes place several years after “Dawn of the Dead” (1978), and there aren’t many people left. Most of the film is people yelling at each other, and Steel and Rickles laughing like hyenas gets annoying really fast. Dr. Logan is funny, but also obviously a loon, but he’s interesting. The creature effects are much improved here, although the scale of the whole story is pretty small overall.
Kevin’s Commentary
This one had a heavier focus on the survivors and how they were dealing with their situation – not very well in fact, with stress, ptsd, despair, and fear constantly looming. Plus plenty of zombie action of course. The effects were excellent, stunts were very well done. We just see part of Florida, so we don’t know how the rest of the world is doing. I thought it held up nicely for its age, and I was very entertained.