Dawn of the Dead (2004 film)

Dawn of the Dead is a 2004 action horror film directed by Zack Snyder in his feature directorial debut, with a screenplay by James Gunn. A remake of George A. Romero's 1978 film of the same name, it stars an ensemble cast that includes Sarah Polley, Ving Rhames, Jake Weber, and Mekhi Phifer, with Scott Reiniger, Tom Savini, and Ken Foree from the original film appearing in cameos. Set in Milwaukee, the film follows a group of survivors who try to survive a zombie apocalypse holed up in a suburban shopping mall.

Producers Eric Newman and Marc Abraham developed the film rather as a "re-envisioning" of the original Dawn of the Dead, aiming to reinvigorate the zombie genre for modern audiences. They bought the rights from co-producer Richard P. Rubinstein (who produced the original) and hired Gunn to write the script, which adopted the original's basic premise but is oriented around the action genre. Intent on making the remake a straight horror, Snyder took over to direct with the goal of keeping every aspect of the production as grounded in reality as possible. Filming took place from June 9 to September 6 of 2003, on location in Toronto, Ontario, Canada where a now-defunct shopping mall that was slated for demolition was used. The special makeup effects were created by David LeRoy Anderson, and the music was composed by Tyler Bates in his first collaboration with Snyder.

Dawn of the Dead was theatrically released on March 19, 2004, by Universal Pictures. Despite Romero's distaste for the film, it earned generally positive reviews from critics, who saw improvements over the original in terms of acting, production values, and scares; though felt it lacked character development and was excessively gory as well as indifferent to Romero's preoccupation with consumerism. Likewise, the film was a commercial success, grossing $102.3 million worldwide on a $26 million budget. Retrospective reviews have called Dawn of the Dead Snyder's best film. A spiritual successor, Army of the Dead, was released on May 14, 2021.