The 'Dead' films allow me to talk about things that a drama, say, won't. 'Dawn Of The Dead,' which was set in a shopping mall, is on one level about consumerism; 'Land Of The Dead' is a response to Bush.
I go to conventions and universities and talk to young filmmakers and everybody's making a zombie movie! It's because it's easy to get the neighbors to come out, put some ketchup on them.
I'm amazed. I go to these conventions, and the fans that come, sometimes my line goes all day.
Zombies are always moving fast in video games. It makes sense if you think about it. Those games are all about hand-eye coordination and how quickly can you get them before they get you.
Most of my stuff was sort of of-the-time. 'The Crazies' was, basically, we were angry about Vietnam, and it had a reason for being.
In the old days, there were three networks, and all of a sudden, Walter Cronkite is the most trusted man in America. Everybody believes what he says, not even thinking. In those days, we didn't even know it was being spun. We were very willing to just listen to it and go along with.
I sympathize with the zombies and am not even sure they are villains. To me they are this earth-changing thing. God or the devil changed the rules, and dead people are not staying dead.
Pittsburgh, for a while, became a production centre. There was one $400 million year. Hollywood was bringing productions in there. Films like 'The Silence of the Lambs' and 'Innocent Blood.' So my guys, the guys I worked with, were able to have careers and live at home. But then it dried up, and a lot of my friends left.
Back then, in 1968, everything was suspect - family, government, and obviously the family unit in 'Night of the Living Dead' completely collapses. That's what we were focused on.
If I fail, the film industry writes me off as another statistic. If I succeed, they pay me a million bucks to fly out to Hollywood and fart.
For a Catholic kid in parochial school, the only way to survive the beatings - by classmates, not the nuns - was to be the funny guy.
I thought Godzilla was a mess, the monster had no character and the humans didn't either. They forgot to make the movie that went along with all these wonderful effects.
I like guys who are understandable and good guys who are flawed.
I grew up on the old EC comic books before the Comics Code in North American and with all sort of good-natured fun. I never had nightmares I think because all of the old horror stuff that I was exposed to was well meaning in a certain sense.
The grotesque has never really affected or frightened me. I guess it's real-life stuff that frightens me much more.
My stuff is my stuff. I do it for my own reasons, using my own peculiar set of guidelines.
If one horror film hits, everyone says, 'Let's go make a horror film.' It's the genre that never dies.
I don't think you need to spend $40 million to be creepy. The best horror films are the ones that are much less endowed.
There are very few horror films that I think are worth their salt.
The horror films that I've made have been satirical in one way or another or political, and I really think that's the purpose of horror. I don't see that happening very often.
