Night of the Living Dead
Continental Distributing | Release Date: October 1, 1968 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
89
METASCORE
Universal acclaim based on 17 Critic Reviews
Positive:
16
Mixed:
1
Negative:
0
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
100
ConsequenceMichael Roffman
This is the great American nightmare, in which neither families, friends, neighbors, nor lovers can save you, and no matter what you try and no matter where you go, it won’t stop until you do. There is nothing more terrifying than that. Read full review
100
Slant MagazineJeremiah Kipp
A stark, eerie and unrelenting parable of dread. There’s a brute force in Night of the Living Dead that catches one in the throat. Read full review
100
EmpireKim Newman
Part of its strength is that it’s not a glossy, predictable Hollywood horror and so it has a grainy, semi-amateur, black and white look which gives it a dread sense of conviction. Read full review
100
San Francisco ExaminerStaff (Not Credited)
Dead is a movie you want to dismiss as another, gross supernatural B-movie: campy fun. But, shot and edited by Romero himself, the film is an astounding technical knockout, often so expressionist that the daylight seems afraid of the dark. The horror is so unalloyed that dead look decidedly, frighteningly human. Read full review
100
Time Out LondonStaff (Not Credited)
Whenever it seems there might be a glimmer of hope, Romero cruelly reverses our expectations. The nihilistic ending, in particular, has to be seen to be believed. Chuckle, if you can, during the first few minutes; because after that laughter catches in the throat as the clammy hand of terror tightens its grip. Read full review
100
Austin ChronicleMarjorie Baumgarten
Due more to how it makes you think rather than to what it shows, Night of the Living Dead gets under your skin and burrows into your blood and psyche. Read full review
100
The GuardianSteve Rose
It remains a nightmare experience that’s not easily brushed off. And despite its ramshackle scrappiness in production terms, and some dated gender politics, the storytelling is first class, pitching us straight into the action, but only revealing its full hand gradually. Read full review
90
Chicago ReaderDave Kehr
Made for pennies in Pittsburgh. Its premise—the unburied dead arise and eat the living—is a powerful combination of the fantastic and the dumbly literal. Over its short, furious course, the picture violates so many strong taboos—cannibalism, incest, necrophilia—that it leaves audiences giddy and hysterical. Read full review
90
New York Magazine (Vulture)Amos Barshad
Witness as the African-American protagonist (who has kept the panicked survivors alive) meets a fate that has more to do with prejudice than carnivorous appetites. Sometimes reality can be as brutal as any nightmare alternative in celluloid. Read full review
90
IGNCliff Wheatley
Romero’s zombies are terrifying in black and white, but one could even argue who was the true monster in the movie: the undead or the living? Read full review
90
The New YorkerPauline Kael
It would be fun to be able to dismiss this as undoubtedly the best movie ever made in Pittsburgh, but it also happens to be one of the most gruesomely terrifying movies ever made.
90
Village VoiceApril Wolfe
Up until 1968, horror had been escapist. But Night of the Living Dead made horror serious business. Read full review
88
Chicago Sun-TimesRoger Ebert
The movie had stopped being delightfully scary about halfway through, and had become unexpectedly terrifying. There was a little girl across the aisle from me, maybe nine years old, who was sitting very still in her seat and crying. Read full review
88
LarsenOnFilmJosh Larsen
The definitive zombie picture. Read full review
80
TV Guide MagazineStaff (Not Credited)
Despite mostly unprofessional acting, near nonexistent production values, homemade special effects, and cheap grainy black-and-white film stock, the film is a triumph. Read full review
70
VarietyStaff (Not Credited)
Although pic’s basic premise is repellent – recently dead bodies are resurrected and begin killing human beings in order to eat their flesh – it is in execution that the film distastefully excels. Read full review
50
The New York TimesVincent Canby
Night of the Living Dead is a grainy little movie acted by what appear to be nonprofessional actors, who are besieged in a farm house by some other nonprofessional actors who stagger around, stiff-legged, pretending to be flesh-eating ghouls. Read full review
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