Возвращение живых мертвецов (англ. The Return of the Living Dead) Американский фильм ужасов с элементами комедии 1984 года

Возвращение живых мертвецов (англ. The Return of the Living Dead) Американский фильм ужасов с элементами комедии 1984 года режиссёра Дэна О’Бэннона. При бюджете $4 млн, в США фильм собрал $14 237 880. Первоначально фильм должен был снимать Тоуб Хупер, а одним из продюсеров быть Джордж Ромеро, однако его попросили отказаться, дабы не причислять этот фильм к его известной серии. Другой продюсер Ричард Рубенштейн желал вообще отказаться от упоминания словосочетания «Живые мертвецы». Премьера фильма состоялась 15 мая 1985 года. The film has its roots in a novel by John Russo also called Return of the Living Dead. When Russo and George A. Romero parted ways after their 1968 film Night of the Living Dead, Russo retained the rights to any titles featuring Living Dead while Romero was free to create his own series of sequels, beginning with Dawn of the Dead.[9] Russo and producer Tom Fox planned to bring Return of the Living Dead to the screen in 3D and directed by Tobe Hooper. When Hemdale Film Corporation experienced difficulty raising funds for the movie and delayed the start of production, Hooper backed out to make Lifeforce Dan O’Bannon was then brought in to give the script a polish and was offered the director’s seat, becoming his ’first big film’. He accepted on the condition he could rewrite the film radically so as to differentiate it from Romero’s films. The film was the first production design credit for William Stout, who would go on to do production design for the Conan the Barbarian franchise among other films. The appearance of the zombies in the film was inspired by the mummies of Guanajuato, Mexico and the Bog People of Wales, as well as artwork from EC Comics. The story’s featured “2-4-5 Trioxin“ chemical developed by the “Darrow Chemical Company“ for the military was a play on the real-life Dow Chemical Company and its involvement in the 1960s with the manufacture of Agent Orange, scientifically known by the name 2,4,5-T Dioxin and used in the US Military’s Operation Ranch Hand and on Canada’s CFB Gagetown Canadian Forces Base in rural New Brunswick during the Vietnam War as a powerful defoliant. Return of the Living Dead makes up a lighter purpose for the chemical’s usage, with character Frank suggesting that it was being sprayed on cannabis crops in the 1960s. The Return of the Living Dead was a critical and a moderate box office success, grossing US$14,237,000 domestically on an estimated budget of US$4,000,000. It currently holds a 91% approval rating on the review aggregate website Rotten Tomatoes, with a rating average of 7.2/10 based on 43 reviews. Its consensus reads: “A punk take on the zombie genre, Return of the Living Dead injects a healthy dose of ’80s silliness to the flesh consuming.“ It was also nominated for four Saturn Awards, including Best Horror Film, Best Actor for James Karen, Best Director and Best Make-up, by the Academy of Science Fiction, Fantasy and Horror Films. Roger Ebert gave the film three out of four stars, writing that the film is “kind of a sensation-machine, made out of the usual ingredients, and the real question is whether it’s done with style. It is. Stephen Holden of The New York Times called the film a “mordant punk comedy,“ and stated that it “is by no means the ultimate horror movie it aspires to be. Colin Greenland reviewed The Return of the Living Dead for White Dwarf, and stated that “The movie sprawls shapelessly but comfortably, with plenty of gruesome jokes.“