“Braaaiinnnns!”

Zombie horror films, tending as they do to involve the trope (or tropes) of zombie apocalypse have become so prolific as to define their own film genre, one worthy of their own top ten list many times over just for their themes, tropes and types.

These are my Top 10 Zombie & Zombie Apocalypse Horror Films, as one of my shallow dips or top tens on the spot.

 

S-TIER (GOD TIER – OR IS THAT DEAD-TIER?)

 

1 – EVIL DEAD (1981 – PRESENT)

 

Okay, okay – this is cheating a little as it’s not really zombie horror as such since the titular evil dead are killed and reanimated by demonic possession…but I can’t not mention my favorite horror film franchise here now, can I? Particularly when there is a large overlap between the two, not least the reanimated corpses.

 

A-TIER (TOP TIER)

 

2 – 28 DAYS LATER (2002 – PRESENT)

 

Yes, I’m counting the franchise through 28 Weeks Later through to 28 Years Later (as there was no 28 Months Later) but the first film remains the best, arguably the most definitive modern zombie horror film after Romero and Russo – certainly bringing new life (heh) to the fast zombie trope.

And yes, it is cheating a little, albeit in a more technical way than the Evil Dead franchise, in that its fast zombies aren’t actually dead but living humans infected with the Rage virus, reduced to mindlessness except for the titular rage. The virus is the true terror, terrifyingly contagious both in its speed and ease of infection through bodily fluids.

 

B-TIER (HIGH TIER)

 

3 – DEAD & BURIED (1981)

 

Dead & Buried rounds out my top three zombie horror films – interestingly, all my top three zombie horror films are arguably not zombie horror as such in one way or another. This is the closest of my top three films to zombie horror but still not archetypal zombie horror in the style of Romero and Russo, lacking the ‘viral’ zombies or zombie apocalypse.

 

4 – BRAINDEAD / DEAD ALIVE (1990)

 

Before Peter Jackson did The Lord of the Rings, he did splatterpunk schlock like this – and it’s a hoot.

 

5 – CEMETERY MAN / DELLAMORTE DELLAMORE (1994)

 

Probably the most ”artsy” zombie horror film you’ll see (with Anna Falchi as one of the hottest female characters in a zombie film) – good luck keeping track of the plot.

 

6 – SHAUN OF THE DEAD (2004)

 

“Go to the Winchester, have a nice cold pint, and wait for all this to blow over”.

Shaun of the Dead is probably my favorite zombie horror film to watch – classic pulp fun, but incredibly layered with easter eggs and shout-outs to zombie apocalypse horror.

Billed as a RomZomCom – or romantic comedy with zombies.

 

7 – ZOMBIELAND (2009)

 

One of the better known zombie apocalypse films – and one of the most fun to watch.

 

8 – LAST TRAIN TO BUSAN (2016)

 

Zombies on a train!

East Asian film and TV – in this case Korean film – have taken to the zombie genre with a vengeance.

 

9 – CARGO (2017)

 

Australian zombie horror films are surprisingly prevalent – this is one of the more highbrow (and emotional) ones, starring Martin Freeman

 

10 – ALIVE (2020)

 

Another fun zombie apocalypse horror film from Korea, using its highrise setting to good effect.

 

HONORABLE MENTION

 

(1988) THE SERPENT & THE RAINBOW

 

Stretching the definition of zombie horror film – going back to the origins of the zombie in Haitian vodou belief.

 

(2003-2014) UNDEAD & WYRMWOOD

 

More Australian zombie horror films – if Cargo is the highbrow end of the spectrum, these are more to the lowbrow end (and filmed on shoestring budgets to match). Pulp fun!

 

(2007) PLANET TERROR

 

Robert Rodriguez and Quentin Tarantino do for zombies what they did for vampires in From Dusk Till Dawn.