Following the events of Night of the Living Dead, this sequel opens in Philadelphia’s WGON TV studio, where news of the dead rising to feast on the living has spread, and society appears on the verge of collapse. News producer Francine (Gaylen Ross) and her boyfriend Stephen (David Emge), a traffic watch pilot, plan to steal a news chopper and escape.

Meanwhile, the police raid a housing project, where black and Puerto Rican residents have refused to comply with the government’s orders to burn their dead. After dealing with both zombies and fascist cops, white SWAT team member Roger (Scott Reiniger) and resourceful Black SWAT member Peter (Ken Foree) go AWOL and escape with Stephen in the chopper.

Their supply of food and water runs low, so they land on top of a shopping mall. The survivors block the doors with trucks and sweep the area clean of the undead, who Roger rationalizes are drawn to the mall because “They don’t know why, they just remember. Remember that they want to be here.” The novelty of their sanctuary eventually wears off, and the survivors realize that their haven has become a prison.

Written and directed by George Romero, Dawn of the Dead was produced by Richard Rubenstein and Dario Argento, who raised or directly contributed to the film’s lean $500,000 budget. It became one of the most successful independent pictures of all time and helped usher in the splatter genre, as makeup effects in horror film became more elaborate and disgusting. Tom Savini and his eight-man crew provided the movie’s gore.

The film has a huge fan base, most of whom endorse this as one of the two best zombie movies ever made, and one of the best horror films of all time. They typically cite the gore and the suspense, Romero’s commentary on consumer culture and American society in general, and the chemistry between the characters as reasons why this is a masterpiece.

I had a far less rabid reaction. Dawn of the Dead has intelligence, but never employs any of it in the making of the film. It’s woefully cast, not really scary, and at 126 minutes, feels too long. You can draw up a list of why this movie should be great, or why it makes sense that it would be great, but nothing that actually made it on screen plays that way.

Romero’s motivation for the sequel didn’t come from box office incentives, but from a friend whose development company managed the Monroeville Mall in Pennsylvania. Romero was given a tour and was inspired by the crawl spaces above the shops and his friend’s boast that people could ride out an emergency in the mall, should one ever occur.

Most of what works in the film is the mall. Romero gets terrific production value out of it, though the possibilities of what type of worlds could be created here were actually explored better in the remake. The inherent satire on consumers as mindless zombies scores points, but so much of the actual film is amateur hour: the dreadful performances, dialogue, music (some of it by Argento’s band The Goblins) and pacing.

As for the zombies, characters frequently run up behind them, either knocking them over or scooting past, hardly a terror. Though occasionally creepy, this isn’t a good horror movie, and even Savini’s gore fails to warrant notice today. This is all message, with story and character irrelevant. Romero wants to appeal to the intellect of the viewer, and that’s a noble step for any film to start with, but as with so many of his efforts, Romero just doesn’t have the resources to go anywhere with it.