Lisa Marie has been posting some very good pubic domain horror films for the past couple weeks and I think it’s about high time I posted one of the best public domain films. This one happens to be a horror film and also happens to be one of the best horror films ever made. I would be of the mind to call this one of the most important films ever made in the last hundred years.

The film I speak of is George A. Romero’s classic and iconic horror film from 1968 simply called Night of the Living Dead. I’ve reviewed and posted this film from over a year ago, but it’s only been recently that Youtube has had a quality HD version of the full film uploaded to its site. Now, people don’t need to go find and buy the countless DVD versions of this film floating around in almost every store imaginable. I think even 7-11 and corner mom-and-pop stores carry a dvd of this film. This is why public domain films can be such a boon to films of the past (though also a curse since some transfers of pubic domain films are beyond awful) that tend rarely get a video release.

Fortunately, Night of the Living Dead is not one of those films. It’s the opposite in that it’s a film that many consider the birth of modern horror cinema and one of the perfect example of guerrilla filmmaking. It’s a film that didn’t just change how we look at horror now (gone are the gothic trappings that most horror had prior), but it also was one of the few horror films to successfully marry not just scares but thought-provoking themes and ideas. Even now most horror films fail to do one of the other let alone both at the same time.

The modern zombie genre of entertainment (films, stories, video games and even protest movements) owe it’s existence to this little low-budget horror film from the late 60’s by a Pittsburgh native and his friends who decided to pool their money together and make a horror flick. It’s a film that still stands the test of time. When all the hoopla over the Paranormal Activity nonsense, remakes of horror (both good and bad) and teen-sanitized horror goes by the wayside this film will continue to impress, remain relevant and still scare (pardon my French) the shit out of young people discovering it for the first time.