Shaun is well set in his patterns when a pretty big obstacle is thrown into his path. It seems that the dead have arisen from their graves and are shambling around London town. What’s a lad to do? Why go to the pub, of course.
Shaun (Simon Pegg) is an appliance salesman who is a creature of habit. He gets up, goes to work, and eventually ends up at his favorite pub, The Winchester. This pattern is annoying his girlfriend Liz (Kate Ashfield) who is egged on by her friends David (Dylan Moran) and Dianne (Lucy Davis). She’s tired of the same old routine, Shaun’s best friend Ed (Nick Frost), and spending every evening at the Winchester.
She’s given him one more chance to make things more exciting, but when he blows it she breaks up with him. If Shaun’s life wasn’t looking dire enough, he’s visited by his stepfather Phillip (Bill Nighy) to remind him of his visit to his mum (Penelope Wilton) and not to muck it up and his roommate Pete (Peter Serafinowicz) is also tired of Ed’s slovenly ways.
Things do have a tendency to get darker before the dawn, but it’s the dawn of the dead the following day as a cataclysmic event causes the dead to rise from their graves. Soon the London populace is getting eaten alive and it’s up to Shaun to save Liz and take her to the safety of… The Winchester?
Simon Pegg had found a certain amount of fame with the UK series Spaced. Pegg and director Edgar Wright would take an episode of Spaced and be inspired to make a feature length film about zombies. The results would be a delight to both zombie fans as well as fans of dry British humour (spelt the dry British way).
The praise for this film would get them zombified cameos in George A. Romero’s fourth “Dead” film, Land of the Dead. The film makes may references to Romero’s zombie films, Shaun of the Dead – get it, as well as numerous other horror flicks.
Part of the fun is recognizing the various references (a trivia track helps out). It’s all done with great joy by the cast, for an apocalyptic zombie film that is, and I’d imagine that they had great fun shooting it.
Shaun of the Dead is presented in a 1080p high definition transfer (2.35:1). The disc features four commentaries: the first with actor/writer Simon Pegg and writer/director Edgar Wright, the second with actors Pegg, Nick Frost, Dylan Moran, Kate Ashfield, and Lucy Davis, the third with Shaun’s mum and dad (he’s not my dad, he’s my stepdad) Penelope Wilton and Bill Nighy, and finally there’s a track with the various people that play the zombies.
Universal’s U-Control features a pop-up storyboard and trivia track, labeled Zomb-o-meter. The remainder of the special features is in standard definition. “Missing bits” includes 13 minutes of “extended bits” with optional commentary, 10 minutes of outtakes, the 35 second “Man who would be Shaun” has Pegg and Frost impersonating Connery and Caine, the 2 minute “Funky Pete” replaces a naughty word with “funk,” and the 3 minute “Plot Holes” has storyboards to fill in some story bits.
The “Raw Meat” section contains 25 minutes of video diaries, 4 minutes of casting tapes, the 13 minute Edgar and Simon’s flip chart, a 2 minute SFX comparison, 2 minutes of makeup tests, and the 7 minute EPK featurette. “TV Bits” has about 10 minutes of specially shot bits that appear on televisions in the film in extended form.
There’s also a zombie gallery (photo gallery, 2000 AD comic strip, poster designs), a collection of trailers totaling around 8 minutes, and a storyboard gallery that can be accessing during the movie. The disc is also D-Box and BD-Live enabled.
Shaun of the Dead is even more relevant in the age where zombies are the new vampire (or whatever the new line is). It’s a hilarious take on the genre but also features some gentle jibes at a myriad of genres.
Shaun of the Dead [Blu-ray] is now available at Amazon . Visit the DVD database for more information.
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