Land of the Dead

Land of the Dead is the latest (though probably not last) in the Dead series that George A. Romero created 37 years ago, and just as the zombies were evolving with each movie, Romero was also evolving. This time is no exception, as he brings us the most character focused chapter of the now quadrilogy, and these characters, be them humans or zombies, truly rule the movie, and some of them will become instant classics.
Romero sure knows what he's doing here, giving us one of the most pleasant movies, and arguably (not right now, maybe in 10 years) the best movie of the series.

The story is simple as always (though Day's kind of sucked), with the humans now living in a closed city protected by electric wire fences, thanks to the rich people (led by Kaufman), who put their money and power to help the poor, and in exchange are the owners of everything and the more privileged can live in a huge paradise building called Fiddler's Green. There's a group of trained men who work for the city, going out to get food and whatever the people need. These men (led by Riley), ride a huge truck called the Dead Reckoning (Land's original title), which has every possible weapon and is designed to go through anything that's ahead of it. In its way are the zombies of course, which now rule the streets of the world (or at least the U.S.), and as in the previous movies suggested, they are now much stronger and smarter than before, and after some internal problems in the city between the rich and the poor, the zombies find a way in, and all hell breaks loose.

What's great about the movie are its character, even though the main hero Riley (played by Simon Baker) is not as good as the ones around him. Classic character number one is Charlie (played by Robert Joy), Riley's friend and a man that at first look looks like a zombie because of his burned face. Charlie is good guy with great lines and a very good aim for zombie's heads. Next is Slack (played by Asia Argento), the girl of the group. She doesn't have that much to do, which is weird having in mind that the ladies were very important characters in the previous movies.
Then is John Leguizamo as Cholo. He is Riley's second at command though they are not very good friends. Cholo likes to get extra stuff (like booze and cigars) from their trips and then take them back to Kaufman (played by a very great Dennis Hopper) as gifts, dreaming that he will let him buy a place in Fiddler's Green someday. But when Kaufman tells him that it'll never happen, Cholo steals the Dead Reckoning and threats Kaufman with destroying the city if he doesn't get paid. Kaufman then hires Riley to get the tank back from Cholo, which Riley accepts to do but at the same time he plans to steal it again so he can retire for good and leave the city. Besides Charlie and Slack, there are two soldiers sent by Kaufman going in search for the tank, one of them Classic character number two named Pillsbury (played by Pedro Miguel Arce), a huge Samoan who doesn't care about Kaufman and joins Riley. Samoan Guy (as I call him) is great, and though is a very small part, it really leaves an impression of awesomeness because of his actions.

Then the zombies, as we get a handful of unforgettables. They are led by a zombie credited as 'Big Daddy', but I call him Gas Station Manager Zombie, and he's awesome. It's great because Romero put black guys in the lead in all the previous movies except this one, instead, Gas Station Manager Zombie is a huge black zombie and he's the most evolved zombie so far. They can now communicate between them, not talking of course but moaning and just pointing at stuff and making hand signals. Gas Station Manager Zombie is always the one that learns everything first, even how to shoot a machine gun!. He's always the one in front of the pack when they attack and the one that creates most of the chaos. After him are Soccer Girl Zombie (Number Nine in the credits) and Butcher Zombie, who are also great and instant classics.
Go to the next paragraph if you don't want the Zombie Cameos spoiled though I think pretty much everybody knows about them.
Makeup guru and the MVP of the series Tom Savini roars the streets (his Zombie name is Blade) at one point and he gets a whole sequence of rampant human killings that will surely get the entire theatre on their feet cheering. Awesome cameo.
Then the ones I was most expecting, by Shaun of the Dead masterminds Edgar Wright and Simon Pegg, but I'm totally sad because I missed them. And none of my friends saw them nor we saw any zombies that could be named Photo Booth Zombies as they are credited. I think they got cut and will be in the DVD.

But yes, the zombies are back and in top form. Great characters (and their weapons), great dialogue and gore, gore and more gore thanks to the amazing makeup work by Gregory Nicotero (no idea why Savini didn't participate in this one).
George A. Romero certainly knows what his audience wants and he delivered like no one else could with Land of the Dead, making for an extremely satisfying comeback to the genre he created, and hopefully will continue.