George A. Romero Quotes

I'm like my zombies. I won't stay dead!

If I fail, the film industry writes me off as another statistic. If I succeed, they pay me a million bucks to fly out to Hollywood and fart.

I also have always liked the monster within idea. I like the zombies being us. Zombies are the blue-collar monsters.

When there's no more room in Hell, the dead will walk the Earth.

I always thought of the zombies as being about revolution, one generation consuming the next.

I've always felt that the real horror is next door to us, that the scariest monsters are our neighbors.

A zombie film is not fun without a bunch of stupid people running around and observing how they fail to handle the situation.

As a filmmaker, I love the medium. I have a great affection for it and I've been lucky enough to do all different kinds of films. The greatest part of the success I've had comes from horror. I love the idea of mixing humor and horror and to me, it's all a giggle.

My stuff is my stuff. I do it for my own reasons, using my own peculiar set of guidelines. I'm not a student of the genre. I don't care what anybody else does.

Zombies are the blue-collar monsters

My zombies will never take over the world because I need the humans. The humans are the ones I dislike the most, and they're where the trouble really lies.

I'll never get sick of zombies. I just get sick of producers.

Just because I'm showing somebody being disemboweled doesn't mean that I have to get heavy and put a message behind it.

My opinion of a good zombie walk is to loll your head as if it's a little too heavy and the muscles have begun to atrophy.

Collaborate, don't dictate.

There are so many factors when you think of your own films. You think of the people you worked on it with, and somehow forget the movie. You can't forgive the movie for a long time. It takes a few years to look at it with any objectivity and forgive its flaws.

If one horror film hits, everyone says, 'Let's go make a horror film.' It's the genre that never dies.

Nothings ever real until its real.

Movies are about escape.

I don't think you need to spend $40 million to be creepy. The best horror films are the ones that are much less endowed.

As great as Ed is, the wisdom out here is that he can't carry a movie. They'll pay him $3 million to be the second banana in Julia Roberts things. But they won't put up $3 million for an Ed Harris movie.

I think zombies would fit in anywhere. You can tell any story, and put zombies in it. I don't know how I'd find the backing, but I think it'd be great to make a zombie gangster movie.

It is amazing to me how deeply into the popular culture the creature has become. There are zombie walks in every major city. I live in Toronto, and last year 3,000 people came out dressed as zombies.... I do not get it. Maybe it's an easy costume: Splash some ketchup on and rip up your jeans -- although most people already have torn jeans -- and you're done.

I like guys who are understandable and good guys who are flawed.

As a filmmaker you get typecast just as much as an actor does, so I'm trapped in a genre that I love, but I'm trapped in it!

I don't want a zombie society. I don't want to go that far.

I grew up on DC Comics, moral tales where the bad guys got their comeuppance. To me the gory panels or grotesque stuff just made me chuckle.

Ever since 'Lassie' and 'Old Yeller', I won't watch animal movies. Animals in movies always die.

The most realistic blood I've seen is when Marlon Brando gets beat up in On The Waterfront.

The Thing from Another World' was the first movie that really scared me.

For a Catholic kid in parochial school, the only way to survive the beatings - by classmates, not the nuns - was to be the funny guy.

My stuff is my stuff. Sometimes it's not as successful as some of the other stuff. But it's my stuff.

Zombies are the real lower-class citizens of the monster world and that's why l like them.

Anybody who tunes into Rush Limabaugh already knows what he's going to say and is already inclined to agree. So it winds up creating tribes.

I keep a little notebook of things that I can do to the zombies that might be silly and fun.

When I was old enough to go to movies alone, I got to see 'Frankenstein' and 'Dracula' on the big screen. I just fell in love with them.

I've never been able to reuse characters, I've often wanted to. I've never been able to get people to cooperate. I can't get anyone together on any kind of deal.

Zombies are always moving fast in video games. It makes sense if you think about it. Those games are all about hand-eye coordination and how quickly can you get them before they get you.

I think you're only free if you're working on very low or huge money.

Collaborate, don't dictate. Every department head has something to offer. Listen and gratefully accept their offerings. They're moviemakers, too.

I really believe that you could do horror very inexpensively. I don't think it has anything to do with the effects, the effects are not the most important parts.

People called 28 Days and 28 Weeks zombie movies, and they're not! It's some sort of virus; they're not dead.

I go to conventions and universities and talk to young filmmakers and everybody's making a zombie movie! It's because it's easy to get the neighbors to come out, put some ketchup on them.

Everybody knows the rules, even though some break those rules.

It would be very hard to write a serious drama and say some of these things. You can be much more abstract and allusive with horror, and it's very forgiving to the author. You don't necessarily have to take an absolutely positive position. You can just write whatever.

You can fall on your face easily if you go off in a certain direction. The Birds is a good example, some people are really phobic about birds flying over their heads, and some don't care. So, it's a personal thing.

I've gotten letters, but mostly from Bible-belt types who say, you must be Satan! They come right out and call me Satan and hope that I'm damned to hell.

I can't really make fun of zombies. They're not liars. They're not cheats.

I expect a zombie to show up on Sesame Street soon, teaching kids to count.

Hollywood doesn't trust me, and we don't really mix. When a movie has stars, everything in the budget goes up, even the catering costs. I just don't like the process of having Suits all around, so I prefer casting unknowns. It adds another level of tension - you don't quite know what to expect from them. My movies don't even need that much money.