"The Dead Don't Die" Jarmusch's critique of civilization and respect for George A. Romero

George A. Romero is the “godmother of independent films”

Jarmusch was born in 1953, so when he was 18 years old, " Night of the Living Dead " was being talked about as a "midnight movie" in New York. This probably coincided with the time when he started studying filmmaking at New York University.

In the Criterion interview mentioned above, he said, "I first saw this film in the early '70s. It had become a cult movie, so I watched it over and over again. I then followed other Romero films such as 'Dawn of the Dawn of the Dead ' (1978), ' Dawn of the Dead ' (1985), ' The Crazies ' (1973) and ' Martin ' (1977), but the ones that had the most impact on me were ' Night of the Living Dead' and 'Dawn of the Dawn of the Dead'."

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Romero started making his own low-budget films in Pittsburgh in the late 1960s and made them a success in New York with his "Midnight Movie" film, while Jarmusch became a central figure in the new independent film movement that emerged in New York in the 1980s.

I think Jarmusch had a lot of respect for Romero as a pioneer in the independent film world.

He said of Night of the Living Dead, "I think of him as the godmother of our cinema. This film is a homage to him and an extension of his work" (Criterion.com).

While "Night of the Living Dead" begins with the protagonists visiting their family graves, "The Dead Don't Die" starts with police officers going to a cemetery, a reference to Romero's work right from the start.

Looking at the content, "Night of the Living Dead" depicts the bizarre experiences of several men and women who escape from Dawn of the Dead and spend time in a small house. It reflects the fears of Americans in the late 1960s, who were shaken by the Vietnam War and racial issues. In the aforementioned "Midnight Movies," Romero says, "Monsters are inside of us, in the gaps between us and other people, and we create them ourselves."

Meanwhile, Jarmusch made a similar statement about his new film, which satirizes modern climate change and material civilization: "The Dawn of the Dead come from within us. They are us" (Criterion.com).

The two directors also have something in common when it comes to their interpretation of Dawn of the Dead.