Final Draft

Vampires, goons, and monsters are all creators of the night. They are only seen hidden in the dark. I wonder why I never came across one. It leads me to the question are they real and where did they come from? This question is for you to decide. George Romero produced the outstanding film called “Dairy of the Dead.” He uniquely turns the film into a small story about zombies which I find amazing.  Throughout the film Romero also shows other points that support his strategy such as how the government and news media hide information from the public to keep and how the human race will do anything for survival based on what is put on the internet. The purpose of the movie was to capture the truth on how media affects our daily lives. In Romero’s Dairy of the Dead, and Jason Creeds team Death of Death, both authors use characters to send a message about how the internet and national media portray real world events and how to protect themselves in from such events. Make-up and special effects are used to expose to the audience that the events in the film are very realistic. Finally, Romero uses a movie within a movie; this gives the audience a different perspective on how the movie is played out.

Within this film there is a film called “Death of Death” taking place as well, which is produced film student by Jason Creed.  In the film there was some kind of revolution going on where dead people started coming back to life. It starts off with an immigrant family maybe from Mexico that turn into the living dead, or as stated in the film as zombies.  The news spreads all over the internet and radio station of the zombie attack. Meanwhile, Jason Creed found himself shooting a movie about zombies. Jason and his team find out about the attack on a radio broadcast and try to figure out whether or not to take the situation seriously. One of the team members took immediate response to the board cast as other waited to see what was going on, however, they all ended up deciding to go home with their families. There were more and more people becoming zombies, to the point that the hospital and even their homes were unsafe. Throughout all of the tremendous attack, Jason Creed is filming every detail. Creed produced interviews form his team member just in case they were not going to survive through the outbreak. Throughout the attack of the zombies, lots of dishonesty from the government was taking place. The government was broadcasting to the people that everything is going be ok and telling them to just live the life’s they had until that point, when all the people knew that was a lie. In about the middle of the film you start to see a change in the attitudes of the characters in the film. Every day people were becoming savages. They would do anything for food and shelter. Some of the people look at it in a way that they could take over by killing and stealing from others. By the end of the film, Creeds girlfriend took it upon herself to finish the movie and release it to the public so everyone could see what really happened and learn how to live through the attack. The film also was meant to scare the people and show them how humans we act in life changing situations. The last scene in the movie had two rednecks shooting at zombies for fun like they were never once human. These lead Creeds girlfriends to question herself are we really worth saving? Throughout all of the series of events that is taking place, Romero has something hidden through the characters to demonstrate ethos to the audience.

Romero uses the characters to send a message to the public. He uses ethos through the action of the characters. The characters are carrying out a message. The message itself is a bit simple, however, within the message there is something else that Romero is trying to tell the audience.  The media and the government are covering up the details and the truth about the attack and playing it off as if it was a minor problem. Romero used Jason creed and his team to expose the government and their lies. In the beginning of the film, he showed how the news report basically reported what sounded realistic rather than reporting what they actually saw. The government changes the view of what really going on to make society believe everything is alright. Therefore, the public only saw what was reported. People learn how to survive by watching the truth and how to deal with it. The internet is the way of covering the view of the story. In reacting to this outbreak, Creed gathers his team to show the truth for people awareness. It teaches the people how to protect themselves. The message that seemed to be hidden was how the people were changing outside their own nature. You may think that was pretty obvious, but what wasn’t obvious is how the people started turning on each other. The characters that Romero used were a perfect fit. I’m not speaking of the characters themselves, however, about the usage of them.  Normal people (non zombie) were killing and stealing from each other. Romero’s message shows the audience that during time of serious need, the human race will become something that maybe is already installed in us. The truth will not be revealed until time of desperate measures. This strategy gives the audience some kind of awareness. It helps the people protect themselves from themselves. By using make-up and effects it expresses pathos to the audience to capture an emotional appeal to help the audience understand ways to avoid having to use desperate measures.

Make-up and effects are added to show Romero’s way of expressing the emotional appeal to the film. Make up is used to express the characters character. In this case, the zombies are wearing make up in expression of some kind of horror. Effects such as camera motion, sound and tone are used to show another kind of emotional appeal. Different noises and motion of the camera are meant to scare the audience. You may be thinking why would you want to scare them? Well I believe it helps keep the audience attention on the production.  This strategy helps the audience capture an emotional feel to the movie. It helps prepare the audience for real world tragedy. This gives them a guideline of what to do in such cases.  Pathos is used numerous times throughout the scene. In the middle of the film, the characters are at an hospital. Romero uses the zombies in doctor uniforms and blood all over their clothing killing each other. This shows a visual image of pathos. Music that is being played and the sound and tone of it show emotional actions. Without make-up you wouldn’t have an actual sense of how fear feels. With bloodshed, guns and death, the audience would be tricked into believing that the world is a perfect place. In all actuality it not, Romero’s make-up and effects strategy shows the audience that people are dying every day, maybe not from zombies but from war and everyday life. People are dying every day and its being covered up by the people. We are the people, we are hiding the truth from ourselves and that is Romero’s point along with the scaring us. 

Romero’s purpose of placing the film into film is to show the audience the entire viewpoints of the movie. By having two films within each other it make it seem like an actual tragedy. The second is an attachment to the first one. This strategy helps the audience understand how the attack happened. I believe if the film itself was only “dairy of the dead”, you would only see the view as an audience that is watching a normal movie. You understand only the basic concept which is zombies attacking people and how it’s being covered up. You wouldn’t have a clue on how to protect yourself in case of an actual zombie attack, and know the ways of survival throughout it. With it being a movie within a movie, there are benefits. The audience gets to see a two way street of the film. One way is how to view the tragedy and the other is what to do when there is a tragedy of the kind. Basically the audience will be able to see the cause and the effect. Jason Creeds team film effect the audience with awareness by exposing the media. It lets the public see the actual stories of the people. When there became more and more people blogging and telling stories the true became hard to find.  To help support this strategy of make-up and effects, Romero placed a film within another film to also show pathos but more so logos to show a logical reason of the attack and what to do

How people react when there is something going on and things they do when they become scared shows the true nature of us. People tend to do things that they normally wouldn’t do when something it’s at risk. When people are at their last of everything they will do anything to get what they need such as killing stealing to get the basic needs of survival like food and water. This argues that maybe human’s nature is to do such things. Creeds team put it best when the editor stated that “maybe it’s us against them,” (speaking on humans against zombies) however, creed turns it around and say they are us saying that humans are adapting to the habit of zombies. People start to turn against each other. In Conclusion, Romero’s entire purpose of using the element of the characters and the media was to get the attention of the audience to realize that these events could actually happen and what we as the people are prepared to do in such tragic moments. I’m not saying that we can actually become zombies but we can turn true tragic moments into false prospection. Are we prepared by Romero’s movie within a movie to show us what to do in such tragedy? Has the make-up and effects scared us enough where our reactions become more ethical? Finally, have the characters carried out a clear message so that we understand it. To sum it all up, Romero’s strategy’s of using make-up and effect shows an emotional appeal. Romero uses the characters to show ethos by sending a message and the concept of having a film within another is to so logic. With all of the strategies but in place, the entire message makes you question yourself about the truth? Is it true that we are becoming the product of our own environment?