you've got red on you
SPOILERS ABOUND FOR SHAUN OF THE DEAD, OBVIOUSLY
Let’s get the obvious disappointment out of the way— I don’t think that I’m going to be finished with my Buffy the Vampire Slayer rewatch in time to do that essay before October is over, so expect that sometime in November amid my more typical music journalism stuff. Sorry folks. (For what it’s worth, I’m exactly halfway through season 6 and to tell you the truth, both Deanna and I experienced a significant decrease in motivation after finishing “Once More with Feeling” and “Tabula Rasa.”)
However, if you’re good little boys and girls and non-binary gremlins, and you support me over at Patreon, you will certainly still be getting an extra little treat on Halloween morn. Don’t say I never did nothin’ for ya. (In addition to the extra Halloween essay, I’m also considering dropping a list of some of my favorite creepy-as-fuck Internet content, but we’ll see how my curation of that goes. In the meantime, rest assured that you’re still gonna be getting Insane Clown Posse content no matter what.)
Now for another obvious statement: Shaun of the Dead is perhaps the most beloved and acclaimed horror-comedy of all time. Surely, it at least stands in rarefied air among other masterpieces of the form such as Scream (covered previously here) and An American Werewolf In London as horror-comedies that care about horror, character-based pathos, and well-crafted filmmaking just as much as they care about the jokes.
For me, personally, Shaun of the Dead is a film that I have never gotten tired of. Since being introduced to it many (maybe too many) years ago, I have to have watched it well over a hundred times. I know I’m not alone in this by any means— Edgar Wright’s direction and the script, co-written by Wright and lead actor Simon Pegg, rewards multiple viewings with bountiful easter eggs, hidden references, and callbacks, call-forwards, and symmetrical structure aplenty. Additionally, Wright’s films in general are subject to a fervent cult following, due to his delightfully idiosyncratic and stylized brand of filmmaking. So anything I say here has probably already been said before— Shaun of the Dead is immensely popular and has been the subject of much analysis and scrutiny, from so many perspectives, that it’s hard not to worry that I will be beating a dead horse.
Still, my love for Shaun is deep and abiding. From all the times I watched it as a kid trying to catch all the horror references, from the blatantly obvious (“We’re coming to get you, Barbara!”; Shaun has a coworker named Ash; Shaun walks into frame at the beginning of the movie in the exact same fashion as the first zombie we see onscreen in Day of the Dead, and David gets torn apart in the exact same fashion as the character Rhodes from the same film) to the decidedly more well-hidden (characters work at places called Landis or Foree Electronics; the name of the place that does all the fish is Fulci’s; Shaun ignores both a radio broadcast talking about a deep space probe— the cause of the ghoul uprising in Night of the Living Dead— and a news broadcast debunking the theory that rage-infected monkeys caused the outbreak, a nod to 28 Days Later; the jingle that plays at the end of the credits is the mall Muzak from Dawn of the Dead [and in fact several music cues in Shaun are taken directly from the same stock library as Dawn’s]). Much in the same way as how I used Scream, Shaun provided me with both a road map to explore older horror movies as well as a built-in gauge for how well-versed I had become.
But of course, there’s no reason to watch a movie that many times if all you’re coming for is pop culture references. Aside from my pure aesthetic appreciation for the film— it’s exceedingly well-shot and well-acted, and the horror and comedy elements beautifully, woozily, effortlessly blend into each other throughout the film, even during the dark and taut climax— I just want to make some room for my inner screenwriter and say that the script for Shaun of the Dead is maybe the most perfect screenplay ever shot. What I mean by this is that it’s absolutely airtight— there are approximately zero wasted lines of dialogue. Every single line is essential plot information, a set-up, a punchline, a call-back, emotionally resonant, or character-establishing, and often serves several of these functions at once. A fun project to take on (and one that I absolutely do not have the time for) would probably be to watch Shaun of the Dead from the top and jot down how many moments and lines get referenced— and re-referenced, and re-re-referenced— as parts of running gags or as an element of pathos later on in the film. Even innocuous lines or moments that one might miss on a first watch get a call-back— “Look at the state of it” gets used first by Pete and then echoed by Ed after the zombie attack. I’m not too proud to admit that it was only a few days ago that I actually noticed the fairly obvious joke that Shaun’s coworker Noel is the “Noodle” who calls up Ed to buy some drugs twice in the film. (We all miss obvious jokes sometimes.)
In fact, thinking about the brevity of the film shocks me sometimes in comparison to how dense it is— especially when contrasted with Hot Fuzz, which is in many ways just as good of a film, but is much less compact and nearly 20 minutes longer than Shaun. And then I have to do another double take because in addition to telling such a compelling story about a bunch of British losers fighting off a zed-word apocalypse and packing in literally hundreds of jokes, it still catches me off-guard that the film has a ton of emotional weight and resonance behind it as well. From Shaun’s family tragedies to the bizarre relationship dodecahedron between Shaun, Liz, David, and Diane to the way that Shaun manages to develop a healthy relationship with his inner child (Ed, metaphorically) without completely sacrificing it or letting it take over his life like he had before, all the human drama in Shaun of the Dead probably would have made for a great sitcom or romantic comedy in and of itself. It’s been sixteen years and I’m still not sure if any other film has managed to find that perfect balance, or been able to develop all aspects of itself as well as Shaun did.
Which brings me to, incredibly, a fourth level of the film, which is its muted but bleak social commentary. If both horror and comedy are great vehicles for social satire, it’s remarkable how few horror-comedies stretch into that zone in and of themselves, and when they do, they tend to go overboard— Ginger Snaps comes close to perfecting it few times but is still rather on-the-nose, and although I really enjoyed it, the recent 80s-tastic Netflix original Vampires vs. the Bronx isn’t exactly subtle with its gentrification themes. No one would accuse the satire in Shaun of the Dead of being particularly abstruse, but it is presented in a fittingly low-key manner— while all the zombies throughout the movie, in much the same way as the ghouls in the Romero flicks, display the habit of going about their daily activities like they once did (the barflies still hang around the bar; Pete manages to get his clothes off and into the shower), it isn’t until the “post-Z-Day” debriefing news segments that Shaun flips through on TV near the end of the film that the picture really becomes clear: zombies forced to compete on reality game shows; zombies assigned to menial labor in the service industry; the violent events of the zombie apocalypse used as sensationalist fodder for grimly exploitative programs like Zombies from Hell.
It’s nothing so over-done as to make one roll their eyes, but it is an evocative condemnation of late capitalism, where everything up to and including horrific violence against family members has become commodified and usurped into the society of the spectacle, and life hasn’t actually shifted in any meaningful way now that non-sentient zombies are used as slave labor (the implication being, of course, that nothing fundamentally changed— compare the ending of the film to the opening credits, where everyone is going about their jobs and commutes in the same robotic, zombified manner). While the character of Shaun is afforded the benefit of satisfactory personal growth, the world around him is the same as ever. Capitalism adapts itself to new circumstances with brutal and ruthless efficiency.
So with all these different layers at play, what is Shaun of the Dead, at its heart, truly about? It’s about depression. Shaun is 29 and trapped in stasis— he hates his go-nowhere sales job, his relationship is in a holding pattern (he’s been together with Liz for three years and still refuses to take the step of introducing Liz to his parents, which, in conjunction with the endless cycle of drinking at the Winchester every single night, contributes heavily to his numbness and malaise), and he is completely incapable of setting boundaries in his codependent friendship with Ed. Although there are people in Shaun’s life who attempt to force Shaun out of his comfort zone and grow as a person, they are both initially presented as mean-spirited, condescending bullies. While one of them, Philip (played by a magnificently ornery Bill Nighy— “I’m quite alright, Barbara, I ran it under a cold tap”), is afforded character development and arguably spurs Shaun’s personal growth more than any other in the movie, the other— Pete, Shaun’s assholish, career-oriented flatmate— is killed during the climax of the movie. Zombie Pete is shot in the head by Shaun after biting Ed, symbolizing Shaun’s growing confidence in himself (he previously just allowed Pete to be a complete dick to Ed with little backlash) as well as Shaun’s acceptance that he needs to grow up.
The other human antagonist in the movie is David, who is arguably the worst possible version of Shaun— he himself is deeply depressed and insecure, but instead of asserting himself and taking on a true and altruistic leadership role, as Shaun evolves into, he puts Shaun down constantly and cravenly undermines him both before and after the events of the zombie attack, primarily due to his unrequited love for Liz. David digs his own grave by smashing open the window of the Winchester— after Shaun tells him not to— and thus leaving him exposed when he stands in front of it and limply fails to apologize to Shaun after Diane gives him a good verbal whupping (not for nothing, but David also stokes the zombies outside the Winchester even more than the sound from Ed’s gambling machine when he recklessly flips the fuse switches on and off in an attempt to kill the jukebox— the lights flashing on the outside of the Winchester drives the zombies absolutely bonkers). He is then ruthlessly torn apart in the most crowd-pleasing death of the entire movie. There is an alternate take of the scene in which David actually does apologize to Shaun before being devoured by zombies, but I prefer the version in the film itself— David was nothing but a sanctimonious prick and he definitely didn’t deserve any sort of redemption before his comeuppance.
While all the characters are excellent in their own right— and many are given such fantastic gravitas due to the strength of their performances (in particular, Nick Frost gives Ed a surprisingly heartfelt but also delightfully fun and insouciant charisma, while Kate Ashfield explores understated deadpan delivery, exhaustion, and uninhibited rage with remarkable smoothness as Liz), all of the primary characters are there to serve Shaun’s character arc. While David, Pete, and Philip all poke and prod Shaun in a negative fashion, the biggest hurdle we see Shaun overcome throughout the film is when his daffy, doting mother Barbara succumbs to a previously-unseen zombie bite late in the film. While David heartlessly implores the group to let him shoot her in the head then and there, it’s Shaun who ultimately takes the responsibility (David can’t, and he even attempts to shoot Shaun after Shaun rightfully punches his lights out for demonstrating such a pathetic mixture of self-righteousness and cowardice), and while Shaun is clearly in tatters, he does it for the good of the group as well as to give his mother the peace she deserved in the afterlife. This is the moment in the film, for me, that completes Shaun’s transition from static depression to dynamic heroism.
Horror and comedy are probably my two favorite genres of any art or medium, and both are somewhat cursed with a seeming inability to achieve critical respect (unless it’s coming in a pre-approved, critic-friendly package that wraps it up in the grief-filled aftermath of a death in the family or the trauma-laden redemption of an addict and so on and so forth; “elevated horror” like Hereditary and The VVitch and the wave of “sad comedies” from the early-mid 2010s like Louie and BoJack Horseman are what I’m referring to here [I also like all of these things so please don’t come at me in the comments about how I didn’t “get” The Lighthouse or whatever, that’s not the point— in my view “elevated horror” is more or less the same thing as 70s horror classics like The Exorcist, or the wave of 90s films like The Sixth Sense or The Silence of the Lambs which were often referred to as “psychological thrillers” instead]). With that said, it’s pleasant to see that something as blatantly artful yet completely lacking in pretension as Shaun of the Dead is pretty much universally-lauded; I don’t think I’ve met a single who person who professes a dislike for this film, and that’s not something I take lightly because most of my friends are about as cranky and contrarian as I am.
With that being said, it’s difficult to argue with the notion that Shaun, much like those “elevated horror” or “sad comedy” examples I mentioned earlier, completely transcends genre, which is why it’s so beloved among both critics and fans. Truly, though, it’s less a concentrated postmodern blend of genres and more of a (and I do hate this cliche phrase) love letter to one style of film in particular, but in the process of making that love letter, all sorts of genuine heart and elemental cleverness found their way through because of the nature of the people driving the project. All of these different aspects— horror, comedy, romance and human drama, social satire— can be found in effective populist films, they’re just often not noted as such (Rob Zombie and David Gordon Green’s Halloween remakes are perfect examples, actually). Honestly, although the credit it gets is more than well-deserved, part of me does wonder if a significant reason for Shaun’s critical acclaim is that it’s British (it’s actually one of the few British comedies that I genuinely find lives up to the reputation that British comedy has as dry, ironic, absurdist, and cutting— I find most British comedy to be pretty broad, obvious, and annoyingly loud and abrasive, honestly, which, to be fair, is probably how they see most American comedy).
Ultimately, however, all the hand-wringing about critical dissonance and elitism aside, the only thing left at the heart of all of this is Shaun of the Dead itself. And I’m just glad that such a perfect little movie exists— one that feels tailor-made for me, but somehow manages to make millions of others feel exactly the same way. Shaun as a movie wasn’t just unique for its time— it’s still extremely unique, and I’ve never found another movie that quite so expertly balances all the tones with as much deftness as Shaun does. Like, if another movie can give me the same feeling— the same combination of unnerving dread, winking humor, and satirical bite— as the scene where Shaun walks through his neighborhood post-zombie apocalypse and doesn’t notice it happening around him (while the scene itself mirrors a previous scene shot-for-shot with alarmingly precise attention to detail), I would like to know about it immediately.
As almost everyone reading this will undoubtedly know, Shaun of the Dead is only the first in the Three Flavours Cornetto trilogy, all directed by Edgar Wright, all written by Wright and Simon Pegg, and all starring Pegg and Nick Frost— Shaun is the strawberry red installment (for all the blood and gore), while its follow-ups Hot Fuzz and The World’s End are original blue (because cops) and mint green (because aliens) respectively. Those movies are probably the only other ones that come even close to nailing that tonal juggling act, though in my opinion neither does it quite as well— Hot Fuzz is much more overtly comic and The World’s End’s sick undercurrent of maudlin tragedy and adult failure, while making for an extremely rewarding experience and a fittingly weighty end to the trilogy, is a bit of a constant downer in comparison to the previous two.
Although there are many other horror-comedies that I love— this month’s series of write-ups didn’t even touch some material that I would consider definitive of the form, like the early work of Peter Jackson, Young Frankenstein, or the first seven installments in The Simpsons’ Treehouse of Horror series— I will probably always consider Shaun of the Dead to be the peak of the genre. I hope you do too.
Check out my Patreon this Saturday for a special write-up. Aside from that, I’m happy to be moving back to our regular programming now that October is coming to its end. Not that I don’t love talking about this stuff, but I know what you guys come here for, and at the end of the day, it’s what I’m best at. Still, it’s nice to know I’m capable of stretching my legs to coffin length when it counts.
-xoxo, Ellie
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