In the 2004 remake of George A. Romero's original 1978 Dawn of the Dead film is arguably the greatest zombie movie ever, from the man who essentially invented the sub-genre.
Naturally, lots of horror fans were quite against the idea of remaking Dawn of the Dead, especially with a director attached who at that point had only helmed music videos. Surprisingly enough though, Snyder's Dawn of the Dead redux actually went on to earn widespread acclaim, and some would still cite it as his best film to date. It's just another case of audiences making snap judgments before seeing the final product.
One reason Snyder's Dawn of the Dead remake worked so well was that while it retained the central premise of zombie outbreak survivors coming together to seek shelter inside a shopping mall, the characters and scenarios presented beyond that were new. This helped differentiate Snyder's film from Romero's. Another big change came with the zombies themselves, who now sprinted like Rage Virus-infected humans. Here's why Snyder went that route.
Dawn of the Dead: Why the Zombies Run in Zack Snyder's Remake
In George Romero's films, Danny Boyle.
Snyder isn't really wrong on those counts, as even Romero's films have used the slow, shuffling zombie for comedic purposes, and so did Edgar Wright's zombie comedy Shaun of the Dead in the same year the Dawn of the Dead remake was released. The Walking Dead has also shown on many occasions just how easy it is for an armed, healthy human to waste standard zombies, to the point where some do it for fun or to kill time. Snyder's fast zombies definitely aren't beings to be trifled with, and are a clear and present danger to anyone who comes anywhere near them. Of course, as Romero himself has pointed out, rotting corpses being able to run makes zero logical sense. Then again, neither does the dead coming back to life at all, so that's kind of a wash.
