Dawn of the Dead

Romero's zombies reach a shopping mall, four survivors barricade themselves inside, and the film spends two hours on the joke that the dead return to the mall out of habit. It is a horror film, a broad satire of consumerism, and an action picture, and it holds all three without dropping any.

Tom Savini did the effects and plays a biker, and his gore here set the standard the whole splatter cycle then chased. Goblin scored the European cut, which runs faster and meaner than Romero's own.

Long, gaudy, and one of the few films on this site with an actual argument.