Watch Local: Night of the Living Dead

Some films are so deeply ingrained in American culture it’s hard to know why the almighty zeitgeist swoops down and chooses a movie to rise above the rest. In the case of this holiday staple, we do know why and it’s fascinating.

Director George A. Romero and John A. Russo titled their film “Night of the Flesh Eaters”. At the eleventh hour the film’s distributor, Walter Reade Organization, changed the title to the indelible “Night of the Living Dead”. In the rush to change the title card, they forgot to add a formal copyright statement. No big deal, right? We all make typos (save yours-truly, word-perfect every time). In steps The 1909 Copyright Act, which states that publishing a work without a proper copyright notice means it forfeits copyright protection. AKA don’t pass go, go straight to the public domain. For context, Mickey Mouse’s debut short “Steamboat Willie” enjoyed 95 years of raking in cash, where “Night of the Living Dead” immediately lost its ability to charge license fees.

Here enters the double-edged sword. The filmmakers make $0 when the film is shown. That’s the bad news. The good news is, at the same time, television enters its teenage years, and it does what teenagers tend to do: stay up late, and push boundaries.

Almost every region had its own late-night horror host. We had ours: the legendary Sammy Terry and his Nightmare Theater. These were all ramshackle local productions, made all the more endearing with their handmade costumes, sets, and “Show Must Go On” attitudes. So get played, “Night of the Living Dead” did.

These shoestring productions received a golden gift in the “Living Dead”, it was free to air. Not only that, it wasn’t the rubber monster picture where all zippers are seen. It was an F-I-L-M, capital ‘F’, film. Compared to the typical B-movie fare shown alongside it, “Night of the Living Dead" must have seemed revelatory. Romero claiming he lost out on tens of millions isn’t exactly true. His film wouldn’t have played nearly as often if it had cost money to play (and also wouldn’t have gotten him out of filming industrial instructional videos as a day job.) Sometimes, mistakes pay.

In the midst of the Civil Rights Movement, just five years after the passage of the Civil Rights Act, the hero of a widely played, genre defining film is a black man. There isn’t anything overt in the casting. Duane Jones's Ben is just the hero of the movie. I’m drowning in leading men that are 5’ 7” with a goatee, so I can’t imagine what that representation meant to so many for nearly 60 years.

Still to this day, the film delivers chills. If you’ve seen it, the quote “They’re coming to get you, Barbara!” instantly recalls the iconic voice, hair and spectacles of actor Russell Streiner. It’s in our cultural bones. Just look what it spawned: a major sub-genre in horror, the zombie flick. Run down your own mental list of what came after. It’s too long to list here.

On Oct. 22, “Night of the Living Dead” will be playing free at our Tivoli Theatre, sponsored by Civilian Brewing Corps. So come on down and get your popcorn, it’s going to be a scream.