The Crazies Full Analysis

The Crazies full film analysis

The crazies is a film about an accidental toxin spill in a small towns lake (Ogden Marsh, Iowa) and it slowly spreads around the town leaving the citizens infected which turn them into zombie like creature who have no self-control over themselves and are psychological turned into brutal killers who target normal living things in this case the surviving people. The film was originally written by George A. Romero in the 70’s as the original film was released in 1973. However the screenplay writers for the 2010 version were Scott Kosar and Ray Wright. It was directed by Breck Eisner who has directed a current 10 titles some of which being TV shows. The main stars in the were Timothy Olyphant who played David the sheriff, then there was his pregnant wife Radha Mitchell known as Judy, alongside them was his Deputy Russell Clank played by Joe Anderson. Later on in the film you meet the last main character who is Becca played by Danielle Farnum, these are the four main characters that fight for their survival.

The narrative structure that the film follows is Todorovs narrative structure, it follows the 5 stages he came up with which a horror film follows. At the start they are in a calm state of equilibrium all in a happy society where it looks like nothing could touch them and they all get along very well. The second phase of his theory is the disruption by an action, this is when they are at the baseball game and the man walks out with a gun and disrupts the peace and shocks everyone. They don’t fully understand what is happening just yet they notice strange things are happening but until the first sighting of a psychotic person it doesn’t fully sink in. The 3 of them investigate into what has happened to work out more; they discover it was the toxin spill in the lake that caused the disruption of the equilibrium. They then recognise something isn’t right and look further into it, and come across many boundaries on the way. They come across a camp where the government who are trying to cure the infected this is the attempt to repair the disruption but it gets over run by a walker which upsets the equilibrium again. Then finally they get away and slowly you see the equilibrium being reinstated.

This horror thriller mystery genre sticks with most of the conventions of a horror film. You could say the costumes worn by the characters go with the stereotypical horror theme. Especially the American sheriff (main character) straight away by what he is wearing you can tell he is the main protagonist and throughout the film he is going to lead a big part within it. He always keeps the costume on and is always in the leading role. He stinks to his policing instincts to get the group through the terror and hurdles they come across. The other characters are just normal civilians in normal attire so you can’t really see if they are important or not. The setting of the film is in an old remote American Hillbilly town; straight away any viewer knows something weird or bad always happens to a town like this, from the chainsaw massacre to Jason Voorhees. When the horror starts to kick in the setting just enhances the horror behind it because you know they are alone and the nearest city and normal civilisation seems miles away from them. They don’t really leave this area throughout the film they just go through different locations within the setting.  The décor of the setting is all quite old and out of place décor not something you would see in the next city. the general outlook of the place is outdated that why the psychotic killers goes so well with the setting because it just makes the whole film a lot more creepier for the viewer. You don’t really get much music within the film. There is more silence to create the tense feeling for the audience. The villains aren’t  don’t actually know what they are doing so I wouldn’t class them as villains or bad people because they have just suffered from a government toxin spill which has caused there psychotic ways it’s just unfortunate they go for other humans.

In summary I believe this film goes with Todorovs theory and conventions. It sticks to all 5 of the criteria throughout the film. The film outdone itself profit wise and all in all was a great success.