#5 – Dawn of the Dead (2004)

Bite your tongue, you say? Hey, horror movie remakes are a shifty business. You can slap a fresh bucket of blood on a shiny new cast and make money on name recognition alone. Dawn of the Dead (2004) surprised us all. Featuring the questionably faster zombie update for the new millennium, this movie commented just as loudly to our consumer gluttony and our post 9/11 fears than did the original for its time.

#4 – Night of the Living Dead (1968)

I remember seeing this when I was younger being legitimately scared. In the discussion between old school and new school, this is the best argument for the old way zombies moved and interacted. Originally shot in black and white, George A. Romero’s feature length debut revolutionized horror by taking if from a genre to an industry. This is the film that started it all.

#3 – 28 Days Later (2002)

The film responsible for the resurgence of popular zombie movie, 28 Days Later featured, for the first time, the updated, quicker zombie (see above). This added another dimension to the layer of the zombie as a character as they now prove they can adapt and hunt versus mindlessly slugging around for killings. A very stylized and realistic (if that’s possible) take on zombie attacks.

#2 – Evil Dead (1981)

No other horror movie is as well regarded by its cult following than the Evil Dead movies. This is the first movie that perfectly combined horror and comedy. The graphic nature of the violence and gore is so over the top it actually lends to the comedic tone of the film. The film also launched the careers of Sam Raimi and Bruce Campbell, who are both still at their best when doing the things that first made them famous in these movies.

#1 – Shaun of the Dead (2004)

Less a funny zombie movie than a comedy with zombie settings, Shaun of the Dead isn’t just the best zombie movie; it is one of the best comedies to come out in the last five years. Fueled by the kinetic directorial style of Edgar Wright and the hilariously tight script by Wright and star Simon Pegg, this movie follows the minutiae of a day in the life of an appliance salesman who has to face the fact that his life isn’t what he thought it would be. He toils through his mundane existence until a zombie outbreak forces him to try and reconcile with his recently estranged girlfriend while at the same time, trying to save humanity that happens to be on the verge of an apocalyptic zombie uprising. Come on, who hasn’t dealt with that problem before?