Zack Snyder’s “Dawn of the Dead”, a remake of the 1978 film of the same name (directed by the undisputed king of zombie films - George Romero) is widely renowned as one of the most popular zombie films of all time. The film grossed over $102 million worldwide, making it one of the few zombie films to make over $100 million at the international box office. The film generally follows Ana (Sarah Polley), a nurse who progressively teams up with a zombie-killing hit-team comprising of a policeman, a young couple, a salesman and other survivors of the worldwide plague producing the flesh-eating zombies, who seek refuge in a mega Midwestern shopping mall.
The opening 5 minutes in which we see Ana working at her job as a nurse in a hospital, then clocking off and driving home are essentially just setting the scene, however these scenes are still worth taking note of. One shot in particular involves a bird’s eye view shot of Ana driving home on a sunny day in her car whilst Stereophonic’s “Have a Nice Day” plays over the top of the scene. Subtle suggestions are inserted into the dialogue to hint at the idea of a zombie outbreak, but not enough for the viewer to have a chance guess at that possibility. When she arrives home, she is greeted by her spouse, who she eventually falls asleep with without seeing the “Special News Bulletin”.
The horror-esque music sets in during the next shot, where the camera is positioned in the hallway and begins to track towards the slightly ajar door of the couple’s bedroom. The camera then cuts to a close up shot of the door handle from inside the bedroom. A focus pull is used in this shot where the camera is focused on the door handle as it swings open to reveal a small, blurred figure standing in the doorway. The horror music builds up as the Dad notices his daughter Vivian standing in the darkness of the doorway, and climaxes as she steps out into the light of the room, to reveal her face and neck streaming with blood.
The father’s instantaneous reaction is to rush over to see why his daughter is covered in blood, but this proves fatal as she tears into his neck, biting off a large piece of flesh. The lighting and location of these shots are that of a high contrast to the events unfolding with them, as it’s all happening within a seemingly pleasant residential area in the early morning.
Later on in the film we see an establishing shot of the mall where they eventually hold out in. The lighting and bright colours again are a high contrast to the events unfolding, as well as the long, low-pitched notes playing over the scene.
The non-diagetic sounds of the immortal Johnny Cash's "The Man Comes Around" plays over the titles in the opening sequence which was created by Kyle Cooper. He also used actual human blood when designing the film's opening and closing credit sequences. The titles transition from solid text into bloody streaks, as seen in the screenshot below, and in-between titles we can see short clips from the news, showing devistation on the streets such as fires, killings and even a reporter being killed by a horde of zombies.
