Messaging the Monstrous

The Undead

Jul 24–30, 2022

MoMA

Day of the Dead. 1985. USA. Written and directed by George A. Romero. Courtesy Photofest
  • MoMA, Floor T2/T1 The Debra and Leon Black Family Film Center

Horror cinema is the house the undead built. Zombies, ghouls, and vampires have been abundant on screen since the birth of film, but it wasn’t until 1968 that the undead became the scariest thing of all: us. When George A. Romero released Night of the Living Dead that year, the postmodern horror era began. No longer were monsters relegated to living in faraway castles; now they were our friends, neighbors, and family. As horror hit closest to home, we saw the undead become perfect vessels into which filmmakers could project our sociopolitical reality. The representations of racism, capitalism, fear of science, declining cities, and war in these films are as relevant today as they were 50 years ago—and perhaps even more so since the COVID-19 pandemic turned our world upside down. Importantly, the undead also allow us to transcend the unknowability of life after death and, ultimately, ask us to question what it means to be alive.

This section of Horror: Messaging the Monstrous is anchored by the quintessential (and unabashedly political) “Dead” trilogy from the father of the modern zombie, George A. Romero, as well as Stephanie Rothman’s sun-soaked bloodsucker classic The Velvet Vampire. Underseen works like Bob Clark’s Deathdream are included alongside contemporary films like Tomas Alfredson’s Let the Right One In and Rob Jabbaz’s The Sadness. There’s also the essential demonic cabin-in-the-woods nightmare of Sam Raimi’s The Evil Dead …because Bruce Campbell’s Ash lives forever.

Organized by Ron Magliozzi, Curator, and Brittany Shaw, Curatorial Assistant, Department of Film, with Caryn Coleman, guest curator.

  • This film series is part of Horror: Messaging the Monstrous.
  • Events

    Licensing

    If you would like to reproduce an image of a work of art in MoMA’s collection, or an image of a MoMA publication or archival material (including installation views, checklists, and press releases), please contact Art Resource (publication in North America) or Scala Archives (publication in all other geographic locations).

    MoMA licenses archival audio and select out of copyright film clips from our film collection. At this time, MoMA produced video cannot be licensed by MoMA/Scala. All requests to license archival audio or out of copyright film clips should be addressed to Scala Archives at [email protected]. Motion picture film stills cannot be licensed by MoMA/Scala. For access to motion picture film stills for research purposes, please contact the Film Study Center at [email protected]. For more information about film loans and our Circulating Film and Video Library, please visit https://www.moma.org/research/circulating-film.

    If you would like to reproduce text from a MoMA publication, please email [email protected]. If you would like to publish text from MoMA’s archival materials, please fill out this permission form and send to [email protected].

    Feedback

    This record is a work in progress. If you have additional information or spotted an error, please send feedback to [email protected].