Night of the Living Dead
Lecture [Return to listing page]
With Steven C. Schlozman, assistant professor of psychiatry at Harvard Medical School and lecturer in education at the Harvard Graduate School of Education.. This presentation is part of the ongoing Science on Screen Series.
Science on Screen at the Coolidge Corner Theatre takes a dark twist with a presentation of Night of the Living Dead, George A. Romero's 1968 genre-defying zombie horror film.
When the reanimated corpses of the recently deceased begin to rise from the earth and seek human flesh as sustenance, a small group of survivors take refuge inside of a farmhouse. Armed only with guns, blunt instruments, and the knowledge that a blow to the head is the only means of taking down their decaying assailants, the living must attempt to last the night. Director George A. Romero’s vision of the slow-moving, cannibalistic walking dead quickly became the textbook definition of "zombie."
Psychiatrist Steven C. Schlozman, a self-described zombie film fanatic and pop culture enthusiast, joins us before the film to explore the theoretical neuroscience of zombies and the psychological effects they have on others. What would the brain of a zombie look like? Why are zombies so (physically) unbalanced? Why are they always hungry? Why do normal people, in the absence of being infected, descend to sub-cortical zombie behavior in almost every zombie movie? And just what is it about the concept of the living dead that continually fascinates audiences? Zombie fans will have plenty to chew on.
Dr. Schlozman is associate director of training for the Child and Adolescent Psychiatry Residency Program at MGH/McLean, and co-director of medical student education in psychiatry for Harvard Medical School. He is the editor of the "Youth Culture Column" for the Newsletter of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, and he writes about the interface of popular culture, music, and the humanities throughout medical education.
Tickets: Museum of Science members and students: $7.75; general admission: $9.75; Coolidge Corner Theatre members: free. Tickets are available in advance at coolidge.org or at the theater box office, 290 Harvard Street, Brookline.
With Science on Screen, the Coolidge Corner Theatre shows a feature film or documentary with a basis in science, combined with exciting remarks by noted scientists and others in related fields. The Science on Screen series is co-presented by the Museum of Science, Boston and New Scientist magazine.
