The Crazies Review

The Crazies review.

Situated at the midway point between the release of his two zombie masterpieces, George A. Romero’s The Crazies feels a bit like a missing link. As it celebrates its 50th anniversary it also feels more relevant today than it did upon its release. Let’s take a look back at Romero’s second horror feature.

Classic movie reviews will contain spoilers.

The Crazies

Directed by George A. Romero

Screenplay by George A. Romero

Starring Lane Carroll, W.G. McMillan, Harold Wayne Jones, Lloyd Haller, Lynn Lowry and Richard Liberty

The Crazies Review

Situated exactly five years between his masterpieces Night of the Living Dead and Dawn of the Dead, The Crazies feels like the missing link between them.  Although it’s not a part of his Dead franchise…it shares a lot of DNA with what they were going to become.  Its themes reused in Day of the Dead.  For decades that topic stood as one of the more interesting things about The Crazies.  The commentary on institutions failing during a deadly plague, however, has brought about a new interest in the film just in time for its 50^th anniversary.

A man made virus is unleashed into the water supply of a Pennsylvania town.  It leaves death or permanent madness as it spreads throughout the town.  The military is called in to contain the town. Scientists work on a cure. 

Let’s start with where The Crazies fits into the Romero canon.  If you were to map out what a movie made between his two zombie masterpieces would look like…it would look exactly like The Crazies.  It lacks the focus and confidence that Dawn of the Dead has but plays on a similar scope.  Coming from the one farmhouse setting of Night of the Living Dead…this is the learning process that results in the step Dawn takes.  It makes mistakes and learns as it goes. 

The biggest difference between this movie and the two more highly regarded ones is the characters.  Both Night and Dawn have rich, memorable characters we follow through hell.  The Crazies does not.  We follow a small group of characters here like in his zombie works…but there isn’t as much to them.  There’s nothing approaching the level of classic characters here.  They feel like a means to an end, never grabbing hold of you.  Someone has to be at the center of the story…and it just happens to be these people. 

The movie looks like a camera test for Dawn of the Dead.  You can spot a lot of the scope and vision of that film in this one’s DNA.  The kind of movie you might walk away from thinking about what the director may deliver in the future.  What makes it fascinating, of course, is that Romero had already made a masterpiece.  We wrote in our Dawn of the Dead review that one of the keys to its success was that it retained the feel of Night of the Living Dead despite being a larger scaled film.  The Crazies feels like the missing steps that connect the two.  A flawed attempt panic on a larger canvas…with the promise of figuring it out.  Five years later, he would.

All of that said, it’s actually Romero’s third Dead film that The Crazies has the most in common with thematically.  Day of the Dead aims directly at institutions failing humanity.  Specifically targeting the military with an underpinning of disdain for science under the surface.  The Crazies paints the same targets.  Whereas Day gave some nuance to the reasons behind the failure…The Crazies is less subtle.  It’s also Romero at his most cynical.

It’s no mistake that it’s a man made bioweapon that infects the innocent townsfolk.  The spotlight is put on the violence perpetrated by the military under the cover of “following orders”.  This was a rebuke of the Vietnam war and not a subtle one.  The government created the problem, bungled the response, and resorted to unwarranted violence passed down the chain of command.  This ties into what makes The Crazies even more relevant today.

A botched government response to a plague.  The Crazies plays differently today than it did in 1973.  The illusions to war were unmistakable upon its release…but war isn’t what is at the foremost of viewers minds 50 years later.  Mistrust of the government, and the failings of the institutions in place to protect us hits differently after the pandemic.  As does a horde of crazy citizens destroying the potential solution created by science.  We’re all mad here.  That’s the messaging.  The innocent people are driven there, the uncaring institutions are built on it.  As the movie ends, we learn that signs of the plague that doomed the town have been found elsewhere.  You can’t contain the madness.

Just because Romero would make better movies…doesn’t mean The Crazies isn’t a good one.  It has the distinct Romero social commentary, displayed here at its least subtle.  The characters leave something to be desired but the situation they’re in is pure Romero.  Fantastic imagery, especially the iconic white biohazard suits worn by the military as they attempt to clean up the town by any means necessary.  More could have been done with the nature of the craziness unleashed…but shocking moments of violence work as well today as they did 50 years ago.  The movie as a whole arguably works even better.

Scare Value

The Crazies is almost stunning in how perfectly it fits between Romero’s two most famous films. His vision was expanding from Night but hadn’t found the focus it would with Dawn. Although it isn’t a part of his classic original zombie trilogy…it feels like a missing piece. Thematically more in line with Day of the Dead…style wise it’s perfectly place by its timing between Night and Dawn. He’s commenting on a much more realistic topic than the dead walking the earth…one that has become much more relevant in our modern times. It just goes to show…while great horror may be timeless…good horror always comes back.

3.5/5

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The Crazies Trailer

If you enjoyed this review of The Crazies, check out another movie that celebrated it’s 50th anniversary recently: Dracula A.D. 1972