There is only one thing in film that I find even more unnecessary than the sequel, and that's the remake. That an industry as large as the film one needs to go back and produce classic films for the second, third or however many times is entirely baffling to me. Of course it's all based on financial decisions, but is the industry so entirely barren of ideas?

Sure, Dawn Of The Dead isn't going to win any Oscars, nor will it go down as a classic years from now. Hell, if I'm perfectly honest, I doubt it'll even be remembered years from now. All of that can't detract though from the fact that it's an incredibly entertaining film that is by turns scary, hilarious and even touching.

A title sequence later which cleverly details what is happening without giving too much away simply from news clips leads us into the action of the film. Ana heads out into the world and discovers something akin to a war zone. Crashing her car amongst all of the chaos, she meets a police offer (Ving Rhames), and stays with him. They run into another group of survivors, all deciding that taking refuge inside the local mall would probably be for the best.

The setting though gives us more than ample oppurtunity] to focus on the characters rather than the action. All of the original group of survivors are given depth, and a motivation of some kind. One of the most brutal sequences of the film comes when a woman who is heavily pregnant has to give birth with no facilities, her boyfriend wholly unprepared. The problem though is that we have so many characters to deal with, meaning there are some who we just aren't given enough information about, so whatever they live or die is really of little concern to the audience. These people are simply zombie fodder. If the film had just focused on a much smaller group of people, a much tighter, possibly deeper film could have been the result.

As well as battling the zombies, the survivors also have battles between themselves. Most of these are non-violent, instead being more psychological battles of will rather than strength. Although a potential for conflict between the survivors and the mall security guards is resolved early on, a number of other grudges are maintained through the film, leading to some compelling scenes.

Sticking with the film right through to the end is also entirely worthwhile, as although an ending of sorts is offered before the credits roll, a much more satisfying one is waiting for those who stay to the end. Few films are willing to wrap themselves up so precisely at the end, and Snyder deserves praise for actually closing his film rather than just going for the obvious trick of leaving the door for a sequel open. Of course, this is Hollywood, and a sequel could still rear it's head, but it's still nice to see a film that isn't created purely as a setup for the next.