Day of the Dead is a remake and an updated version of the old George Romero zombie movie. I can’t take the approach that some horror movie fans did and automatically hate this movie because it doesn’t follow the rules based on his movies because I can’t really remember his movies. I’m sure some people will hate me for saying that, but I kind of blocked out most of his movies except for the original Night of the Living Dead.

The movie follows a group of people in a small Colorado town who are exposed to a virus that causes them to turn into zombies. Unlike the other recent zombie movies where they set up what happened to cause the virus, they completely skipped over that here. I have to say that I didn’t like that too much because I wanted some reason for the virus, but they never gave us one. There are three people from a nearby Army group, a doctor, a teenager and his girlfriend, a local DJ, and a couple who lost their son to the virus. Out of the entire group, there were only a few people who I actually liked in this movie.

The teenagers, especially the girlfriend were very annoying. I actually found myself wishing that they would just throw the girl to the zombies at some point, even though she was one of the only people who actually fought for her life. I did enjoy Nick Cannon because I thought he looked and acted the part, which was a nice change of pace. I could buy Cannon as a military man, but Mena Suvari didn’t look anything at all like a soldier. I think they were looking for someone more recognizable to put in this movie and just decided on her. There was also a subplot about why she carried a gun, but never had any bullets. It would have been nice if they had explained that since they brought it up several times, but alas there was no explanation.

Ving Rhames also made a brief, and I do mean brief role in this movie. I find it funny that they list him as one of the main cast members when his actual role is little more than a cameo. After seeing the movie, I could barely remember him. He plays the same role I’ve seen him play in dozens of movies and I’m beginning to wonder if he ever gets tired of playing the tough, hard as nails guy.

I was also a little baffled at how the people became zombies at all because there wasn’t any type of a timeline established. Some people would get bitten and become a zombie instantly, while other people took hours to become a zombie. People in the hospital that were bit instantly turned, but one man took nearly a day to turn. I did think it was kind of funny that one zombie was able to handle being around people because he was a vegetarian so he wouldn’t eat them.

Overall this was an okay movie. There were some good special effects and some funny scenes that I truly liked.

Rating: 6