Zombie Timeline 1980-2000

23 November 2008

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In the final section of our zombie timeline, that has looked at some of the best movies in this ever expanding genre of film, we look at more recent movies between 1980 to the present day.

Since 2000 and the release of Danny Boyle's 28 Days Later there have been a whole host of movies that have dominated the big screen.

1980

1981 - The Evil Dead: It is the story of five college-age friends who travel to a cabin in rural Tennessee where the stumble upon the Book of the Dead, an ancient tome bound in human flesh and inked in blood.

After unwittingly awakening the unspeakable terror told of in the book, each of the friends is transformed into the evil dead, one by one, except for Ash (Bruce Campbell).

So, Ash is left with no other way to survive than to dismember the living corpses of his sister, girlfriend, and two of his friends.

This cult classic spawned two sequels, Evil Dead 2 and Army of Darkness.

1985 - Return on the Living Dead:

When a bumbling pair of employees at a medical supply warehouse accidentally release a deadly gas into the air, the vapours cause the dead to re-animate as they go on a rampage through Louisville, Kentucky seeking their favourite food, brains.

1990

1992 - Braindead: Lionel, a Mama's boy has the unwanted honor of having to look after his overbearingly evil mother. He ends up falling in love with a local woman who believes that they're destined together.

In a moment of intentional sabotage of one of their dates, his mother is bitten by a mysterious creature that ends up zombifying her.

It's only a matter of time before she rises from the dead a powerful, bloodthirsty zombie. It's only a matter of time before she starts infecting residents of the town and Lionel has to stop her...and them.

1993 - Army of Darkness: In this sequel to the Evil Dead films, a discount-store employee ("Name's Ash. Housewares.") is time-warped to a medieval castle beset by monstrous forces.

Initially mistaken for an enemy, he is soon revealed as the prophesied saviour who can quest for the Necronomicon, a book which can dispel the evil.

Unfortunately, he screws up the magic words while collecting the tome, and releases an army of skeletons, led by his own Deadite counterpart. What follows is a thrilling, yet tongue-in-cheek battle between Ash's 20th Century tactics and the minions of darkness.

2000

28 Days Later:After breaking into a primate research facility, a group of animal rights activists discover caged chimps chained up before banks of screens displaying horrifying, violent images. Ignoring the warnings of the terrified researcher who maintains that the chimps are infected, they begin to free the animals and are immediately subjected to a bloody attack from the enraged creatures.

Twenty-eight days later, Cycle courier Jim awakes from a coma in the deserted intensive care unit of a London hospital. He wanders out into a church where he finds dead bodies piled in heaps on the chapel floor.

A sudden explosion from a makeshift bomb heralds the arrival of fellow "survivors" Selina and Mark. They take Jim to safety and explain to him that this infection is transmitted by blood and overwhelms the infected victim with a murderous rage within seconds.

Britain has been overrun, and they have no way of knowing if it has spread worldwide. Their only hope of survival may lie in the hands of a Manchester group of soldiers, as they claim to have the "answer" to infection and invite any survivors to join them at their blockade. Faced with no practical alternative, the group sets out northwards, unaware that the worst is yet to come.

2007 - Rec: Described as one of the scariest films ever by critics and public alike, [REC] tells the story of a young TV reporter and her cameraman who are taping a real-life late night news programme when things go horribly wrong.

What appears to be a routine emergency call quickly turns to hell as the team are trapped inside a building with no means of escape as things go from worse to worse.

Quarantine is out now.