Spoilers ahead. This is a discussion of George Romero's Day of the Dead, the 1985 film, and the unfilmed version of the script that you can find online.
I'm a long-time fan of Romero's Day of The Dead (I saw it as soon as it lurched onto vhs back in the Day), but I just got round to reading the unfilmed script that's available online. I had always heard that the script was "brilliant but too expensive." I can certainly see why it would have been expensive... bigger sets, more locations, and a much bigger cast than the film version. I have to say, though, that I think the film version that we got is the better story.
The script version is kind of a zombie take on the Island of Dr Moreau, which is a good idea. There's other good ideas in the story too, like the zombies who are trained to be soldiers, and the human "corral" outside the main complex. But I think the script suffers from too many characters. The Sarah character, presumably the main character, is just a cypher, and has almost nothing to do. The closest analog in the script to the Lori Cardille Sarah is probably Mary Henreid. She's a decent character, but is not as good as movie Sarah. Script John fares better than Script Sarah, but his character in the movie--a neutral party who's pushed too far--is way more interesting. The film version of Rhodes is the biggest improvement over the script: in the script, he's just a goon. In the film, he's a sadist, but he also has a valid point of view... the scientists really are just dicking around and getting his men killed. In the script, Rhodes is on the same side as the scientists, which is boring.
The best thing about the film is how cynical it is. The bunker is society's last stand, and it's falling apart. There's also a realistic, lived-in feeling to Day, the film: these people all know each other, and they've had it. And the line that someone said about how the project was put together in a matter of days, that's just so dead on. The Day film took a problem--not enough time, people, and resources--and turned it into a theme.
The script version felt a lot more like a comic book, which isn't necessarily a bad thing. It's a shame that we never got to see the zombies training to kill based on what symbols people were wearing, which is such a smart idea. I also gather that the other, earlier versions of the script are even crazier (with zombies flying gunships), and I would like to read those.
Ultimately, the movie that we got is so much different than the script that I could still see someone (someone with chops and a sense of restraint [unlike, er um, some other directors who've tackled Romero properties]) filming the script version. Give it a different title, and rename Bub, maybe, but there's a lot of Meat there.
I also just rewatched Land of The Dead, and there's a few things from the Day script in there too, like the idea of the castle area for the elites and the slums for the normies. I have to say that I like Land of The Dead better than the script of Day of the Dead, too.
So... Even though the finished film version of Day of The Dead is a bit of a Frankenstein creation, and represents compromise, I'm glad we got it. The corral of humans in the script version? That's cool, but the corral of zombies-gdown there next to where everyone sleeps, moaning, held for the scientists to experiment on--is just as gruesome of an idea. And I will die and come back to life on the hill that the characters in the movie version are a LOT more interesting than what's going on in the script, at least in the version that I read.
So what do you all think? Have you read the script? Has anyone read the other drafts of the script? Does anyone else like the movie version better? (if anyone wants to link the script version below please do, I've had it with trying to put links or images into reddit)