When An Undead Apocalypse First Swept America In The 'Night Of The Living Dead'

A few weeks ago, I drove three hours to reach a screening of the restored print of George Romero's classic black and white zombie film. Sitting in the multiplex theater, I tried to put myself back in the mindset of someone seeing it fresh as the main characters, Barbara and her unnamed brother, find themselves in a cemetery.

"They're coming to get you, Barbara," he teases. "Look, there comes one of them now!"

What they don't know is that an undead apocalypse is about to sweep America and Barbara's brother is about to get eaten by a shambling ghoul. In 1968, theater-goers were also in the dark, with no idea they were seeing a game-changing film.

"It played on a double-bill, with — I think it was — Doctor Who and the Daleks," said Stuart Klawans, a longtime film critic for The Nation magazine. "It really wasn't expected to do anything." In those days, people going to see a scary movie expected it to be pretty harmless, the kind of thing you went to on a date. But, Klawans added, this was not that kind of movie: "There's really no sex appeal in Night of the Living Dead."