The past two decades have seen a revival of the zombie horror subgenre after a long period of creative and commercial dormancy. While it may seem like every possible angle on the undead has been exhausted by filmmakers, the success of 2025's critically acclaimed "28 Years Later" is proof that theater-goers still have a healthy, even frenzied appetite for ghoul-driven carnage. But no proper appreciation of the revenant canon would be complete without seeing these five standouts.
'Night of the Living Dead' (1968)
While the original "Dawn of the Dead" remains the most celebrated of director George Romero's undead movies, the earlier "Night of the Living Dead" is a tighter, more coherent picture. Barbra (Judith O'Dea) holes up in a farmhouse after her brother is killed by a zombie; here she finds a group of survivors, including Ben (Duane Jones), trying to survive the siege together. Because it features a "black man trapped in a house with white people who can't seem to fend off the danger themselves," the movie works as a "critique of racism in America" whose influence has had "long-reaching effects in the zombie genre," said Alissa Wilkinson at Vox.
'28 Days Later' (2002)
The zombie genre was moribund when director Danny Boyle ("Trainspotting") turbocharged Romero's slow, shuffling revenants, turning them into virtually inescapable, fast-moving predators. Cillian Murphy plays Jim, a bicycle courier who wakes up from a coma (I'm sure you can guess how many days after the outbreak) to find that the U.K. has disintegrated after a pandemic of the "rage virus," which turns people into frothing killers within moments of exposure. Boyle's "mingling of naturalistic technique" alongside "highly surreal imagery in which red-eyed creatures attempt to devour the uninfected" makes for a memorable lesson in how "humanity gives way to the monstrous," said Cecilia Sayad at Film Comment.
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'Dawn of the Dead' (2004)
Less a remake of George Romero's 1978 zombie classic and more a total reimagining, director Zack Snyder borrows the shopping mall conceit and little else for "Dawn of the Dead." Ana (Sarah Polley), a weary Milwaukee nurse, barely escapes when a zombie attacks one morning. She links up with a ragtag group of survivors who barricade themselves in a mall as the undead gather outside and threaten their impromptu society.
Snyder "unleashes the chaos wonderfully in the opening twenty minutes" and eventually "lets go of the notion that it's a horror film at all and puts all of its chips on blockbuster action," as the group tries to break out of their retail prison to sail away to safety, said John Saavedra at Den of Geek.
'Train to Busan' (2016)
A relentless, claustrophobic action film, director Yeon Sang-ho's "Train to Busan" follows Seok-woo (Gong Yoo), a selfish, divorced father on board a high-speed train from Seoul to the southern city of Busan to see his daughter. When a virus-stricken passenger boards, she unwittingly unleashes an outbreak whose resulting ghouls make the "28 Days Later" variety look positively shambolic by comparison. A "zombie flick for people who don't really like zombie flicks," it succeeds on the basis of "strongly realized characters, emotional set-ups and payoffs and tight pacing," said Justin Cummings at Critics At Large.
'MadS' (2024)
Forget the odd, unfortunate title — Shudder's single, continuous take, night-of-the-outbreak zombie movie is unforgettable. When carefree party animal Romain (Milton Richie) picks up a woman in distress by the side of the road, she infects him with a virus that turns him into a killer. His girlfriend Anais (Laurie Pavy) is the heart of the film's middle third, as she accompanies the deteriorating Romain to a frenetic house party, slowly falls prey to the virus herself and triggers a terrifying epidemic. The movie "comes to feel like a seeming extension of an inescapable physiological nightmare," said Derek Smith at Slant Magazine, and director David Moreau "creates an all-consuming sense of dread and panic that almost sneaks up on you."
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