Everyone knows that George A. Romero‘s Dead series basically created the zombie subgenre as we know it today, but did you know that Dawn of the Dead in particular had an unofficial Italian sequel that went on to create its own massive franchise? That’s right, Italian filmmaker Lucio Fulci was such a massive fan of Dawn that he created his own follow-up, simply titled Zombi 2 (simply is putting things nicely, more on that later). Fulci’s movie went on to be such a big hit in its own right that it got its own official sequel… then another, and another, and then a ton of unofficial sequels, and so on. Yeah, the Zombie series is just about one of the strangest in all of horror. It’s also one of the ballsiest, nastiest, and grimiest that you’ll find. These movies absolutely rock, so if you dig George A. Romero’s movies, want to drop the satirical elements, and crank up the violence to grindhouse levels, then these are built for you.
George A. Romero’s Dead phenomenon began with 1968’s smash hit Night of the Living Dead and ushered in an entire subgenre of movies. In its wake, tons and tons of flesh-eating gore fests began to hit theaters. In the years after his original chiller, Romero would spend time making a comedy, a psychological drama, then return to the horror scene with The Crazies and Martin. Ten years after his debut, Romero would return to the undead scene with Dawn of the Dead. This film not only cranked up the violence but also turned the satire knob all the way up to 100, primarily jabbing at the American consumer and mall cultures. Like its predecessor, Dawn was a huge hit in countries all around the world, including Italy.
How Did ‘Zombi 2’ Get Made?
For its Italian release, Dawn of the Dead would be re-edited by acclaimed genre filmmaker Dario Argento, scored by the cult classic prog rock outfit Goblin, and released under the title Zombi. Keep that last note in mind, that’s important. The movie was a smash hit in Italian markets, albeit a good bit different than the one that Romero initially set out to make. That being said, Lucio Fulci was one of those folks who saw this new chopped-and-screwed version of Dawn, wrote his own sequel with the intent of it being even more laid back and fantastical than its North American predecessor, and one in which the horror would be ubiquitous. Once things got going, they could never stop, and based on the way it turned out, Fulci nailed it. The film would be titled Zombi 2, and upon finishing it, Fulci believed he had just made a horror classic. Right on big man, because that, you did.
How Does ‘Zombi 2’ Fit into the Zombie Movie Genre?
Zombi 2 was released in 1979, one year after Dawn of the Dead, and is a pretty simple movie, especially in comparison to its predecessor. The film takes place on a cursed Carribean island, where these decaying undead beasts begin to rise from the grave and eat the residents. If you go into this movie expecting an actual follow-up to Dawn, don’t. Zombi 2 is essentially a sequel in name only, taking influence from more avenues of its subgenre than what Romero had made at the time. It fuses a bit of the old-school types of zombie stories found in the classic voodoo-based zombie chillers White Zombie and I Walked With a Zombie, but of course with none of their subtlety or class. No, instead Fulci took those movie’s magical approaches to the undead and infused them with modern ’70s filmmaking sensibilities. This is a grindhouse movie if there ever was one.
Zombi 2 is one of the bloodiest, most brutal zombie movies ever made. Fulci had to have seen Romero and makeup legend Tom Savini’s work in Dawn, told someone to hold his beer, and set out to make the foulest movie ever. Throats are chomped out emitting rivers of blood, rotting corpses even farther gone than anything in Romero’s first two films are on display, eyeballs are stabbed with sharp wooden splinters, and a zombie fights a shark. Yeah, this movie’s the real deal. The first two Dead films pushed the boundaries of what the world was willing to accept in popular, box office-shattering films, but even they don’t have anything on Zombi 2. This movie took the boundaries that people were willing to accept, shot the boundaries straight through the brain, buried them in the dirt, and watched audiences everywhere come back from the dead, bigger zombie fans than ever before. Romero’s movies may have invented the image of zombies that we think of today, as well as their fusion with satirical elements that so many people aim for, but Fulci’s first movie is what made these movies as violent as they can get.
It’s safe to say that Zombi 2 doesn’t have the greatest story on Earth. It’s one of the most bare-bones movies in the history of the subgenre, but what it lacks in character development and themes, it makes up for with its technical aspects. Despite being one of the goriest movies ever, it also happens to be a beautifully shot movie. The 35mm stock that Fulci had this movie shot on is rich with incredibly pronounced, wonderful colors. Not only that, the tropical setting that fills up most of the movie’s runtime makes for an interesting change of pace in comparison to the North American settings in which so many zombie movies take place. The film’s synth score by Fabio Frizzi and Giorgio Tucci is sharp, warbly, and fantastically eerie, mixing a bit of an exotic feel with the sounds that Goblin brought to Dawn.
What Makes the ‘Zombi’ Series’ Titling an Anomaly?
Zombi 2 was a huge success upon release and paved the way for tons of sequels, but it didn’t exactly make things easy for audiences to keep track of. For one, it had an infinite number of title changes that it was released under, including The Island of the Living Dead, Zombie Flesh Eaters in the UK, and Zombie in the United States. Yeah, so that means Dawn of the Dead was released in Italy as Zombi, and spawned its own unofficial sequel titled Zombi 2, which went on to be released in most markets as Zombie. Not only that, Zombi 2, aka Dawn of the Dead 2, aka Zombie, would go on to have a sequel called Zombi 3, which I guess is technically Dawn of the Dead 3, but released as Zombie 2 in the States, and known as Zombie Flesh Eaters 2 in the UK!
Not only that, there would be a Zombie Flesh Eaters 3 that wasn’t even made in Italy, that ended up growing its own little production over in the UK. The same goes for everywhere else that 1979’s Zombi 2 was released. Fulci’s movie was released in a ton of markets, only for those markets to end up making their own sequels to his movie, just like he did with Romero’s, then getting all the numerology of the titles even more jumbled up. There are a ridiculous amount of movies out there that followed up Zombi 2 that have been called Zombie 3, Zombie 4, just flat-out Zombie once again, and so on. What a disaster. This is also without noting that Romero would actually return to the Dead franchise in 1985 to make his own official sequel to Dawn of the Dead, the massively underrated Day of the Dead. What a confusing, totally unnecessary, and avoidable mess of a situation – but a fun brain-bender to try and explain!
Zombi 2 is unquestionably one of the most fun zombie movies ever made. If you’ve seen Romero’s original series and are looking to branch out some into new, gorier territories, then look no further than Fulci’s unofficial gory side quest. Be careful though, because once you step foot in these murky waters, you’re bound to want to explore more, leading you toward an endless sea of official and unofficial sequels, spinoffs, ripoffs, and more. Like the dead themselves, Zombi 2, aka Dawn of the Dead 2, aka Zombie, has been put through the wringer and regurgitated into a bloated, rotting version of what it once was. No matter how you find it though, Fulci’s foray into the world of the undead stands as one of the greatest zombie movies of all time.
