Synopsis
Retrospective documentary about the making of the horror cult classic "The Return of the Living Dead."
2011 Directed by Bill Philputt
Retrospective documentary about the making of the horror cult classic "The Return of the Living Dead."
Miguel A. Núñez Jr. Jules Brenner Don Calfa Linnea Quigley Clu Gulager Beverly Randolph Dan O'Bannon Suzanne Snyder James Dalesandro J. Trevor Edmond Graham Henderson Steve Johnson James Karen Thom Mathews Kenny Myers Brian Peck John Penney John Philbin John A. Russo Paul Sammon Jewel Shepard Stanzi Stokes William Stout Stacey Swain Allan Trautman Brian Yuzna Tony Gardner
¡Más cerebros! Un Regreso de los Muertos Vivientes, 重访活死人归来
"I would've been nude if anybody asked me, and I was a little hurt they didn't." - James Karen
This is such a great, well-produced and lovingly put together retrospective documentary. At two hour it is significantly longer than the film itself, but it always manages to stay informative and entertaining. They hardly ever make docs this good anymore. A true shame. This is ma must watch for anyone who enjoys the movie. It can be found as an extra on the Scream Factory 4k Blu-ray Edition. Just go buy that bloody thing!
This is a fun documentary that is definitely way too long and I imagine only die hard Return of the Living Dead fans will stick through all the way, but if you love the movie, there is some good info in here.
Contrary to popular belief, the creators of Night of the Living Dead (John Russo and George Romero) did not have a personal falling out with the diverging canon of their creation in 1985, with Romero doing Day of the Dead and Russo doing Return of the Living Dead. It was more a studio vs studio rivalry. Russo and Romero remained good friends, were fans of the other's respective movies and cheered each other on.
I also love that Dan O'Bannon is a huge perv who constantly went to strip clubs.
On youtube
Fans of Return of the Living Dead will no doubt be completely aware of all the behind-the-scenes drama covered, and there are few new insights, but James Karen is infinitely watchable. Made after O'Bannon's passing, More Brains still features substantial sit-down interviews with the likes of William Stout - and unlike similar horror film documentaries, some of the participants harbour general hostilities towards other crew members. The feature documentary is only on the first entry in the series - while the second and third films are covered as special features. These were welcome, offering information that wasn't as readily available. It is a shame these couldn't be edited into a more concise overall piece on the initial trilogy, but the existence of the sketchy 2005 DTV entries would undermine its scope as a franchise retrospective.
Glad I was able to end this Return marathon on a relative high.
What a great making-of doc! Absent Dan O'Bannon, who died in 2009, and Mark Venturini (who played Suicide), who died in 1996, they were able to get all the principal members of the cast and crew together 25 years later.
The two things I love most about this film are how it illuminates the effort that went into making Return of the Living Dead and how frank the folks involved are about their experience.
They pulled off some wild stuff with a small budget, and hearing how much thought (and in some cases how many iterations) went into different elements of the finished product was really cool. For example, Tarman (Allan Trautman): specifically casting an actor, rather than using an…
Everything you ever wanted to know about Return of the Living Dead and also real boring minutiae like an actor calling another actor "professional and punctual."
a complete look into the brilliant return of the living dead, this is so in depth and doesn't scrimp on any drama on the set. even if it was a nightmare i'd kill to have worked on this film! i love horror documentaries its just such a unhinged way to make a film, endlessly interesting.
Definitely a documentary that was geared toward those who are hardcore fans to the movie. Dropping in some fun behind the scenes moments and memories from the cast and crew.
The documentary goes from scene to scene with insight on what happened in them. Granted that much of the insights into the movie can be found in featurettes online and in the physical copies of the movie itself. That said, this was still an fun watch to see the crew come together to remind this movie fondly.
Overall this was a good watch.
Distinguishable from most other behind-the-scenes retrospective documentaries largely due to the candor of all involved. I learned a lot I hadn't previously known - like that the original effects artist (who they were actually able to interview!) was fired, or that one "actress" was actually a stripper who definitely, under no circumstances whatsoever, slept with Dan O'Bannon to get the role.
I'd also forgotten that Tobe Hooper was initially slated to direct this - and all of a sudden the nude dance sequence with Linnea Quigley makes a bit more sense. Hooper ultimately opted to film a constantly-nude woman in a (marginally) more narratively-justified (and considerably more anatomically accurate) fashion in Lifeforce, but it seems he was just hellbent on…
Exhaustive. I now know everything about Return of the Living Dead. I've removed all important numbers from my head for the BRAIN space.
This took me to the Return learning tree when I saw it a decade ago, but I’m not sure about the replay value here. I wish the typical cut to talking head one actor interviewed at a time atmosphere of these docs would get fucked. If I were a smarter man with more resources, I’d become a film documentary director. Same shit, different film. Rinse, repeat, profit.
Also Brian Peck stay away from me.
The makers of this documentary seem to be in love with a) conflicting accounts among the cast and crew and b) Miguel A. Núñez Jr. saying "titties". There's some fun nuggets, but I feel like it's a half hour too long.