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The leaves are falling, temperatures are dropping, and decorations are going up. No, it's not officially Christmastime yet — that will start around November 1st, I think. Instead, it's time to celebrate the scariest holiday of all: Halloween (and here you were thinking of Thanksgiving). Once Halloween season starts up, the best way to get in the mood aside from eating candy until you burst is to watch a good scary movie. These days, unfortunately, there aren't many classic horror films to choose from. I think we'll be able to manage; my next two Classic Movie Reviews will be of two of the most famous and influential horror movies. The one coming at the end of the month will be of 1973's The Exorcist (yes, this will be the first time I've seen it); this week, it's 1968's Night of the Living Dead.

It's been more than 40 years since this low-budget film from famed director George A. Romero came out, letting loose zombies onto the big screen. Earlier this month, Zombieland, a horror comedy featuring a few lone humans against an apocalypse of the dead-eyed ghouls, hit the top of the box office, and is looking like a true sleeper hit. That movie was made for just about $25 million; Night of the Living Dead was made for just over $100,000. Things, suffice to say, have changed quite a lot. Interestingly enough, one of the biggest problems I had to get over with Night of the Living Dead is the low, low, low budget. Whereas a movie like Zombieland impresses in part because it feels like it had to have cost twice its budget, a movie like Night of the Living Dead looks like...well, every dollar is on the screen.

The plot is pretty much the same as Zombieland or any other zombie movie: zombies have overrun society, and only a few humans are surviving, trying to stave off complete apocalypse. Unlike Zombieland, there's no humor. Or tension. Yes, this will be something of a negative review, and one of something of a classic. At the very least, there wouldn't be an ...Of the Dead series of films without this one. It seems that Dawn of the Dead, the 1978 sequel that was remade in 2004, is considered the best in the series, but it's probably wisest to go back to the beginning and see where things began. Yes, even though I somewhat regret it, it's important to find the roots of something that's gone beyond being a cult fad into a more mainstream idea.

And yet...here's what's interesting: it took a full decade for a sequel to Night of the Living Dead to come out, despite it being a huge success, considering its small budget. In that time, I would imagine that Romero and his cast and crew worked out things like characters and action and dialogue. There's not much of any of that in the original zombie movie, though, aside from its chilling opening scene. The set-up is deceptively simple: a brother and sister, Johnny and Barbara, are headed to their father's grave to place a cross on it. Once they get there, Johnny taunts his sister about her understandable fears of being in a graveyard, saying, "They're coming to get you, Barbara!" And then they see a man walking toward them. And the man tries to kill both of them, succeeding in offing Johnny.

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