In 1969, a young Roger Ebert wrote an eye-opening piece about George A. Romero’s Night of the Living Dead – and it wasn’t your typical glowing review. In fact, Ebert’s initial write-up was pretty scathing, focusing less on praising the film and more on the shock it inflicted on its audience (particularly kids at a Saturday matinee). Over time, however, Ebert’s perspective on the movie shifted, and he eventually came to admire this cult-classic horror. Below is a deep dive into where Ebert’s original review was published (it popped up in some interesting places), what tone he struck in that 1969 critique, how he later reevaluated the film, and what kind of interactions he had with Romero in the years that followed. 🎥📰
Roger Ebert’s first published reaction to Night of the Living Dead appeared soon after the film’s release – and it quickly gained wide exposure. Here’s a breakdown of its publication history:
Ebert’s full review first appeared in the Chicago Sun-Times (and concurrently in the Miami Herald), and Reader’s Digest printed an abridged version for national readers
The Digest version wasn’t the complete text, but it captured the gist. Other newspapers across the U.S. picked up the story or at least reported on the shocking new horror movie and Ebert’s reaction to it – effectively spreading snippets of Ebert’s commentary far and wide.
Roger Ebert’s 1969 article on Night of the Living Dead is remembered for its alarmist and shocked tone. Reading it is almost like reading a horror story in itself – Ebert vividly describes the film’s gory scenes and, importantly, the traumatized reaction of the audience full of children. He wasn’t exactly condemning the movie’s quality, but he was definitely outraged at the situation (kids being subjected to such intense terror).
Above: A snippet from Ebert’s infamous 1969 article (as reprinted in Reader’s Digest), titled “Just Another Horror Movie – Or Is It?” It was condensed from the Chicago Sun-Times. In this piece, Ebert isn’t reviewing the movie’s artistry so much as describing its on an unsuspecting kiddie matinee crowd. He sets the scene of a typical Saturday afternoon showing turning into a nightmare, with children screaming at first and then stunned into silence.
Ebert recounts in graphic detail how cheerful shrieks turned to dread once the flesh-eating ghouls showed up on screen. He notes that by the film’s gruesome climax – intestines being devoured and all – “the kids in the audience were stunned. There was almost complete silence… [one] little girl… maybe nine years old, was sitting very still in her seat and crying”. The article goes on to say the movie “had become unexpectedly terrifying”, utterly unlike the fun monster flick the kids might have expected. Ebert candidly observes, “I felt real terror in that neighborhood theater”, seeing children who “had no resources they could draw upon to protect themselves from the dread and fear” that the film induced.
He didn’t pull punches about the gore, either. Ebert describes scenes of zombies (though he calls them “ghouls” in the parlance of the time) chowing down on human body parts – one creature, he writes, “ate a shoulder joint with great delight… Another ghoul dug into a nice mess of intestines.” The tone is one of astonishment and a bit of moral anger: How could this extreme horror be shown at a kiddie matinee?
In his piece, Ebert essentially chided theater owners and parents for allowing young kids to watch something so graphic. He stops short of calling for censorship (“Censorship isn’t the answer… Censorship is never the answer,” he wrote), but he strongly questions the judgment of letting children into this film: “I’d want to know what the parents were thinking of when they dumped the kids in front of the theater to see a film titled Night of the Living Dead.” He even slammed the local Chicago police censors for “incompetence and stupidity” in giving the movie a general audience pass just because it had no nudity.
Overall, the original review reads as a scathing commentary – not so much an attack on the film’s artistic merit, but a harsh rebuke of the context in which it was shown. Ebert was frankly horrified (on the kids’ behalf). One commentator later called the article “less of a review than… a righteous rant on parental and film-maker carelessness in protecting children”. Indeed, Ebert basically uses the review to call out how wrong it was to treat Night of the Living Dead as just another goofy monster flick for the Saturday crowd.
It’s interesting to note that in this early piece, Ebert wasn’t concerned with spoilers – he describes the movie’s entire plot, ending and all, in great detail. (So much for suspense!) He also refers to the film’s Black hero, Ben, only as “the Negro” throughout the review, which today comes off as jarring and insensitive. (It was common in 1969 newspaper style, but still, he never actually uses the character’s name.) These aspects give the review a blunt, unfiltered feel – Ebert was primarily focused on conveying how shocking the movie was, not observing modern niceties of spoiler warnings or character analysis.
George Romero later remarked on the intensity of Ebert’s write-up. Romero said he was surprised by how some critics reacted to his little independent film; he quipped that Ebert’s review “all but called Living Dead a movie spawned by the devil.”
In other words, from the filmmaker’s perspective, Ebert’s 1969 piece made the film sound positively demonic. 😈 That quote from Romero (half-joking, half-serious) really highlights how scathing Ebert’s initial tone seemed to the film’s creators.
Despite the alarmed tone of his 1969 article, Roger Ebert’s view of Night of the Living Dead evolved significantly over time. In later years, he made it clear that he actually respected and admired the movie – his issue had been with kids seeing it, not the film itself.
In fact, not long after the original review, Ebert began acknowledging the film’s strengths. By the late 1970s, while discussing George Romero’s follow-up Dawn of the Dead, Ebert looked back at Night and admitted it was “a horrifying work” and “terrifyingly effective,” even though he “attacked it in print” back in ’69 due to the inappropriate audience. He explicitly said he was “disturbed not by the images, but by the audience” of youngsters – implying that as a horror film Night of the Living Dead did its job only too well. So even then, Ebert recognized the movie’s power.
Fast forward to 1990, when the remake of Night of the Living Dead came out – Ebert reviewed the remake and took the opportunity to reflect on Romero’s original. He wrote that in 1968 Romero made “a scruffy little low-budget horror film” that “was truly frightening.” He recalls watching Night with all those kids “screaming and weeping” in the theater, and notes “I believed, then and now, that some films are simply not appropriate for children”. But – and here’s the change – Ebert adds that “at the same time I had to admire the artistry of Romero’s film.” With its grainy B&W look and unknown actors, Romero “created a horrifyingly original vision that has been ripped off ever since”. That’s high praise, acknowledging Night of the Living Dead as the trend-setter for the modern zombie genre. He even called Romero’s Dawn of the Dead (1979) “a superb horror film,” indicating his overall esteem for Romero’s craft.
Ebert later gave Night of the Living Dead a solid retrospective rating. In a note added to his archived review, he mentioned that while he hadn’t given a star rating in 1969 (since it wasn’t a conventional review at first), “if I were to rate it today, I’d give it 3½ stars” out of 4. He also said flat-out “I admire the movie itself” after having seen it a couple more times in the years since that first shock.
So, by the 2000s, Ebert was on record acknowledging Night of the Living Dead as an admirable, influential horror classic – a far cry from the wary tone of his original piece.
In summary, Ebert’s stance went from “Good lord, think of the children!” in 1969 to “This film was a groundbreaking horror achievement” in hindsight. He never exactly trashed the film’s quality in that first article – he was more upset about the context – and indeed as the dust settled, he emerged as a fan of Romero’s work. His later reviews and comments show a genuine appreciation for Night’s creepy atmosphere and cultural impact. He came to celebrate it as one of the first modern zombie movies and a very influential one. What was once an exploitation shocker in his eyes became, with historical perspective, a legitimate classic in his esteem.
What about Roger Ebert’s relationship or interactions with George A. Romero himself? It turns out Ebert and Romero did cross paths professionally, and there was a healthy mutual respect between the famous critic and the horror auteur.
For one, Ebert eventually met and interviewed George Romero, particularly once Romero’s sequel Dawn of the Dead was coming out. In 1979, Ebert actually hosted a screening of Dawn of the Dead at a film festival (the USA Film Festival in Dallas) and invited Romero to attend.
Ebert was a big supporter of Dawn – he considered it one of his top picks – even though the film’s extreme gore caused some viewers to walk out. Ebert wrote about how, during that festival screening, a heated debate broke out in the audience (some yelling “What kind of sick mind could make a film like this?” while others defended it as the best of the fest). Romero was literally standing in the lobby watching people leave, taking it in stride; he told Ebert, “If nobody walked out, it wouldn’t be the movie I wanted to make.” That anecdote shows Romero’s wry understanding that his work was provocative on purpose. And Ebert, to his credit, stood by Romero’s film, arguing in his write-up that Dawn of the Dead was “a very good [horror] film” with savvy satirical themes beneath the blood and guts.
Ebert’s 1979 interview with Romero (published in the Sun-Times) further solidified their professional rapport. By then, Ebert was openly praising Romero’s growth as a filmmaker, noting that “Romero himself has matured as a filmmaker since Night of the Living Dead” and that “Dawn is very assured”.
He even went out of his way to mention that the impact of Night shouldn’t be dismissed – calling it a film that “cut through all the camp and low humor of the horror field and was really horrifying.” And in a candid admission to Romero, Ebert said: “I found it a terrifyingly effective film, and attacked it in print… [such] films shouldn’t be shown to small children.”
Romero surely was aware of Ebert’s notorious review by that point, and Ebert basically explained to him that his only issue was the age-inappropriate screening, not the movie’s quality.
As for Romero’s feelings, aside from the jokey “spawned by the devil” comment, he seemed to appreciate that Ebert later recognized Night’s merits. The fact that Reader’s Digest and other outlets spread Ebert’s 1969 piece far and wide actually helped Romero’s film gain notoriety (even if the review was alarmed in tone). By the time Romero and Ebert interacted in person, any initial friction had cooled. It was more like: Night of the Living Dead had become a phenomenon, and Ebert was one of the early writers who treated it as something serious (albeit in a warning tone). Romero, as an independent filmmaker, likely benefited from the controversy and discussion.
In later years, Ebert continued to review Romero’s films – sometimes favorably, sometimes not, depending on the film. He loved Dawn of the Dead (enthusiastically so), was less impressed by some of Romero’s later zombie installments (Day of the Dead or Survival of the Dead, for example), but he always took Romero seriously as a filmmaker who had something to say through horror. When Romero passed away in 2017, writers noted that Night of the Living Dead “permanently altered pop culture”, and they remembered how Ebert’s early review was a part of that film’s legend – it was “widely read” and republished, contributing to the film’s reputation.
Ebert himself had long since become an admirer of Romero’s genre-redefining work.
To sum up their relationship: Roger Ebert and George Romero started out on seemingly opposite sides – the concerned critic versus the rogue horror director – but over time they came to share a mutual respect. Ebert became one of Romero’s champions, acknowledging the director’s influence and skill, while Romero appreciated that Ebert “got” what he was doing (at least in hindsight). It’s a neat example of how time can turn a once-controversial review into a badge of honor for a cult classic.
TL;DR: Roger Ebert’s initial 1969 reaction to Night of the Living Dead (published in the Sun-Times, Miami Herald, and later Reader’s Digest) was a shocked, scathing essay – he was horrified that children were exposed to the film’s gory mayhem, and he wrote about sobbing kids and inept censors in a tone that made Romero’s little horror flick sound almost diabolical.
However, Ebert did not hate the film itself – and as years went by, he openly praised Night as an innovative and “unexpectedly terrifying” horror milestone. He eventually gave it 3½ stars and cited its huge influence on the genre. Ebert even befriended Romero professionally, interviewing him and championing Dawn of the Dead in 1979. In the end, what began as a critique of a shocking experience evolved into full-fledged respect for a movie that had become a classic – and for the man who made it. 🎬👻
Sources: Roger Ebert’s original Night of the Living Dead review (Chicago Sun-Times, Jan. 1969)rogerebert.comrogerebert.com; Reader’s Digest (June 1969) condensed version titled “Just Another Horror Movie – Or Is It?”barebonesez.blogspot.com; Ebert’s later comments on the filmrogerebert.comrogerebert.com; Los Angeles Times (quote from George Romero on Ebert’s review)latimes.com; and recollections from film historians and Ebert’s colleaguesmonstermemories.blogspot.comrogerebert.com
